


Through the Rough

by artattemptswriting



Series: Per Aspera ad Astra [1]
Category: American Revolution RPF, Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alexander hamilton is transgender, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - College/University, FTM, Friends to Lovers, Genderqueer Character, Lams - Freeform, Multi, Nonbinary Lafayette, Not Actually Unrequited Love, Strap in kids, Trans Alexander Hamilton, Trans Hercules Mulligan, college lams, ftm character, james reynolds is evil, slow burn John Laurens/Alexander Hamilton, this is going to get dark fast, transgender Hamilton
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-01
Updated: 2017-10-23
Packaged: 2018-06-05 18:55:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 33,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6717037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artattemptswriting/pseuds/artattemptswriting
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Things on campus are getting dangerous, but Mary Hamilton has never been one for chosing her timings wisely- and if a revolution gets started in the process, what of it? <br/>•••<br/>The one in which Alexander Hamilton is transgender, Washington tries his best but never gets it quite right, and Peggy Schuyler is the only reason that everyone is still alive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue and Foreword

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fic-wide trigger warnings, disclaimers, and tag info at the end of the prologue.

The room is getting smaller. Or perhaps the people in it are just getting larger.

The Friday evening debate class is full of big personalities and the egotistical stench in the air comes with a certain amount of hormonal rivalry between the handpicked members. It seems comfortable enough; Washington’s study is fitted out with a settee and armchair, all overstuffed leather lost in a pile of throw cushions: but the atmosphere is not. Hamilton, Angelica, Eliza and Burr sit on one side, while Jefferson lounges on the settee on the other side, Madison usually squeezing in next to him and Seabury slouching on the arm. The routine is familiar. Hamilton’s side is far shoddier, and in no way do they manage to pull off the look of unearned affluence that Jefferson carries; Hamilton huddles on the armchair, while the others make themselves comfortable on the huge beanbag. Jefferson’s distinctive southern drawl wears on and on and on, filling the little room. Perhaps Hamilton is imagining things, but even Washington looks a little wearisome tonight, sitting at his desk with less rigour than usual. From the smug smile on Jefferson’s face, it is clear that he believes himself to be winning, and the worst part is that Hamilton cannot focus on anything else. Washington’s eyes tighten at the edges, and everyone is restless- what do they want?

Well, of course, they are all waiting for the brilliant honour-roll, scholarship-wielding, fiery-tempered student to make a stand.

The only problem is that tonight, Hamilton does not feel so brilliant. It is becoming difficult to breathe. The room is definitely getting smaller. Madison’s gaze on Jefferson is a rapt as ever, and Burr is hovering down by Hamilton’s elbow like a useless, brooding storm cloud. Thinking is difficult. They all want him to say... what? Hamilton forgets how to inhale with the realisation that, by god, she cannot remember. What are they debating? The whole evening has been a blur, right from the moment she spilled out of the last official class of the day and found herself standing in a cold shower; and now she feels tears pricking her eyes because why- why is she so useless? Hormones. That is what Jefferson would say.

In fact, that is what he does say.

“Hamilton, are you alright?” air rushes back into Hamilton’s lungs when Washington speaks, but before she can answer Jefferson has leant forwards and his smirk has grown to Cheshire proportions.

“I wouldn’t worry. She is probably just on her period,” and there it is: Thomas-bloody-Jefferson, with that pedantic misogyny simmering below the surface. Hamilton could be sick. It has always been like this. Ever since the first day Hamilton stepped into Washington’s class and exchanged a brutal battle of intellects with Jefferson over a cup of spilled coffee and a stack of notes, they have been set against each other in competition, hatred and mutual, grudging respect. The respect has gotten far thinner since then; the hatred and competition has not. The pattern they have fallen into is anything but welcome. Every time Hamilton _dares_ to try and prove herself, reaching out with a stick to test the waters, Jefferson simply opens his mouth and hornets swarm out. They attack all the places that she hates to think about and leave her somewhere between icy numbness and aching hyperawareness. Blood roars. Tears sting.

“That bears no relation to our debate,” Hamilton stands up. Jefferson does too; but his movements are languid and easy. Almost at once, Hamilton is forced to look up at the man. She cannot back down now. She feels like she is speaking from a great distance outside of her body, looking down from a cold, high place “If you’re gonna debate with me, do it as an equal or not at all,”

“Because you are so quick witted and worth debating with this evening,” Jefferson rolls his eyes. Hamilton is vaguely aware of Washington rising from his seat. Madison looks down at the ground, and Burr murmurs something a lot like leave it alone.

“If all you can do is use slurs and insults, you’re clearly no better,” Hamilton snaps, crossing her arms over her chest. With a smile so wide it must hurt- (Hamilton sure hopes it does hurt, like hell) - Jefferson mirrors her actions. His broad shoulders carry the weight of his haughty bearing with ease.

“Both of you break it up,” Washington is suddenly between them, and Eliza’s hand is on Hamilton’s shoulder. Elizabeth Schuyler has to have superpowers, and that is something Hamilton will definitely stand by; one touch and her soothing warmth seeps through Hamilton’s coiled-spring body. One more slowed heartbeat and she has stepped back to stand by Angelica and Eliza. The older sister places an arm around her shoulders, keeping Hamilton in place with nothing but a kind gesture.

“I think this has been more than enough for one night,” Washington says as Jefferson slinks back, grabbing his nauseatingly magenta blazer from the sofa. Only Jefferson could get away with wearing that. “You’ve all got the weekend ahead of you, but don’t forget that paper needs to be on my desk by Monday. We’ll start fresh next week. Hamilton, _a word_?” Hamilton’s stomach drops. She nods. Eliza’s smile is full of concern as Angelica ushers her from the room. Burr looks decidedly grumpier than he had that morning, and he mutters a goodnight to Hamilton before almost slamming the door. Jefferson, Madison and Seabury all walk out with an easy grace, Madison sort of riding along in Jefferson’s wake and Seabury swaggering by with obvious disrespect. If it isn’t for the odd touches and furtive, secretive kisses behind textbooks, Hamilton wouldn’t have believed that Madison and Jefferson are together; if Seabury wasn’t always trailing the two, Hamilton wouldn’t have thought him associated with them in the slightest.

“Yes, sir?” she asks, as soon as everyone else is gone. Hamilton knows what is coming.

“I already have to put up with you and Jefferson going at it during club meetings, Hamilton. Despite the fact I am not sandwiched between you two in here, it is no better on evenings like this,” Washington momentarily massages the bridge of his nose. “As for your performance tonight—”

“I know it wasn’t my best,” Hamilton sounds more sulky than defiant, but Washington’s deep frown will not allow for anything else.

“You haven’t been your best for weeks,” that is a little harsh

“Sir-”

“No, Hamilton. I cannot deny I am fond of you, but I have been accused of allowing you to do too much. I told the school board I was making sure you could handle it, and I thought you could, but in the light of recent events...”

“ _No_!”her voice is too shrill, too startled.

“I will email the professors who you allow you to sit in on extra lectures and withdraw my permission; I will also unregister you from this extracurricular class and anything else I think you don’t need to be doing,” There is a careworn fatherliness in Washington’s voice that fills Hamilton with guilt. The professor is being perfectly fair. Hamilton knows that, but the news still sticks like a hard lump in her throat.

“I _need_ to keep busy, sir, you don’t understand. I _work_ for everything I get and I _earn_ it fully, but I can’t do that without all the extra classes I take... I-I— I have to keep doing what I do. Jefferson is insufferable and I can’t be expected to take all of his comments just because he has all that money and can pay for everything himself and I can’t!” rushing her words now, praying that if she speaks fast enough Washington won’t comprehend the choked back sobs, nor the blatant disrespect in her tone. There is something pleading in there and she hates it; almost as much as the pity in Washington’s face.

“This is your first year of college, Hamilton. You’re only seventeen and you have a lot to get through. Don’t burn out before you’ve achieved all those dreams you told me about while persuading me to help you,” he places a hand on her shoulder, and she tries not to flinch. “Get it together. You have until the end of Thanksgiving break,”

“That’s less than two months—”

“Do I have to repeat myself?”

“No, sir,” she swallows back the retort she wants to make, hugging herself. Even inside the loose sweater she is wearing, a shiver still finds her, crawling down her spine and sinking it’s teeth into her lower back. Clammy sweat breaks out on her hands, her toes freezing cold inside her boots and socks.

“Goodnight, my bo—Goodnight, Hamilton,”Washington catches himself mid sentence, nodding stiffly. There is a quiver deep in Hamilton’s chest. Her and Washington part ways at the end of the hall. The slight quiver grows into a humming, pulsing realisation and Hamilton feels as if she could cry. _My boy_. That is what Washington had almost said. It is true that Hamilton has never bothered to distinguish herself from the boys; she has never tried stand out as female. _My boy_. And it fitted; it fitted like nothing else in Hamilton’s life ever had done before.

“Goodnight,” she chokes out; that quivering grows into an unfurling, uncurling realisation. There is no way to hush the voice in her mind back to sleep now. _My boy_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First thing: the tags. Before you all tear strips out of me for racist whitewashing this is, first and foremost, American Revolutionary RPF. It's a celebration of Peggy Schuyler being amazing; of John Laurens being a queer historical figure; of Angelica Schuyler as a strong, independant woman; and of Alexnader Hamilton. So why tag under Hamilton- Miranda? Because a crossover involves _themes_ from the second work, and this fanfic is littered with references to the musical lyrics, so I'm tagging under the musical for Copyright reasons (creative commons and all that), but more than that- the characters themselves are inspired by their portrayals in the musical, as well as my own headcannons.  
>  TRIGGER WARNINGS: This is an exploration of Hamilton as a transman in a revolutionary modern setting. As a queer transman myself, this is based off of my own experiences and handles issues that I and fellow trans friends have come up against. Internalised transphobia features, as well as internalised homophobia and, maybe later, issues surrounding being trans and sex. Other topics cover mental health issues, abusive/toxic relationships and self harm.  
> All being said and done, I hope you enjoy this, and thanks for reading this little preamble. Stay safe and have fun


	2. Chapter One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fed up, tired Schuylers and Washington is very confused about gender, but he tries.

_Get it together._

Six and a half weeks. Hamilton does not want to believe that this is real; Washington has always been on her side, a supporter and a fatherly figure, her mentor ever since she arrived on the college campus with nothing but a satchel and a heavy, singed, sea-worn coat over the clothes she stood in. He had sat her down in his office, and told her that he believed. Nobody- not one single person- had ever told her that, and since then their relationship had barely toed the line between professional friendship and mutual companionship. Hamilton could finish the sentences Washington did not know how to put together, she could win one of his smiles when nobody else could and- and-

_My boy._

He saw her as something like a surrogate son, she knew; not out of discrimination for females, but because Washington and his wife could not have children, and he had always wanted a son. When he had first admitted that information during one of their discussions about the way the college is run, Hamilton had privately thought that she could be that son. After all, it sounded so much better in her head than daughter. She had never liked being anyone’s daughter, but life on Nevis had not allowed for anything else.

_Son. My boy._

All this runs through her mind as she climbs the stairs up to her one Saturday morning class- which, she remembers with a sinking of ice in her stomach, is one of the lectures she could be losing. She loves Washington’s History lectures.

“You sitting in on another one of Washington’s lectures, Hammie?” with a clatter on feet on the stairs, James McHenry suddenly appears besides Hamilton, breathing hard. He is one of Hamilton’s friends, a part of the fiery band of students dissatisfied with the way things are here on campus. His curly hair is a mess, plastered to his forehead with sweat, and a pair of bright blue trainers clash with his neat white shirt and dark blue chinos. He leans an elbow on Hamilton’s shoulder, leaving her desperately gripping the banister to keep from falling.  

“Yeah. Damnit, James, don’t scare me like that!” She manages to get out around the pounding of her heart, which is trying so desperately to crawl up to her throat. McHenry only laughs and remains how he is until they reach the top of the stairs.

“I was just jogging with the team, minding my own business when _bam_ \- I remember I have a lecture in five minutes. You can’t blame a man for needing a little support after running across campus and getting changed, then running here in under five minutes,” he shrugs. “Good thing I can do it fast, you know?”

“Hm... there’s room for improvement,” she gestures at the trainers, laughing when his face goes completely pale. She is still laughing when they part ways, him scowling and her feeling buoyed up out of her dark, preoccupied mood.

She is still smiling, albeit it more softly now, when she takes a seat at the back, and pulls out her notebook. Madison is near the front, head bent, huddled in a huge black sweater; Hamilton can only thank her lucky stars- (and God only knows, she has very few of those) - that Jefferson is nowhere in sight this morning. She couldn’t handle his hornets, which would certainly escape even if, for some miraculous reason, he did keep his big mouth shut.

The lecture passes smoothly enough, at first. John Adams arrives late, coughing into a tissue and trying to look apologetic, mumbling about a cold and sitting hastily. Not even his presence can bring down Hamilton. No. In the end, with only ten minutes left to go, it is Washington himself who darkens the sun. The lecture had been about slavery and trading, something which Hamilton had grown up in the shadow of; Nevis was rich with blood money sweated from countless slaves, and Hamilton had witnessed the echoes of it even in the Twenty-First Century. It had been relaxing enough, if not a little nostalgic, until Washington’s eyes seemed to meet Hamilton’s and he straightened his back a little more,

“...I would like to conclude with a brief talk about the island of St Croix, Christiansted, home to a notorious slave prison...” and Hamilton doesn’t hear the rest. She is slammed into a memory of her mother’s eyes, misted with tears, as she tells the story of how her husband had her thrown, quite illegally, into the very same prison Washington is talking about. Where one memory of her mother comes, more will follow and so, invariably, will the one she hates the most; it follows her through sleep to her waking hours. The fever, and the skirt, and the first time she had realised she could no longer play at being man of the house. She barely registers her chair toppling back, hitting the floor, or how the wooden door smarts against her hands when she shoves it open. She only registers the cream walls, becoming darker in colour, closing in on her. Why does every room she is in shrink? Everywhere wants to stifle her, hold her back, and throttle the last creativity and spirit out of her. America was supposed to be different. _Washington_ was supposed to be different.

“...Hamilton? _Hamilton!”_ she blinks, forcing herself to look up, surprised to find herself sitting with her back to the wall, knees drawn up to her chest. A sudden, mortal terror that she could be crying in front of Washington sweeps through her, and she wipes her eyes. Her fingers come away dry.

“Sorry, sir, I just didn’t feel too well- whatever Adams has must... must b-be catching,” she gulps. Her excuses are thin and weak, like tea made with tepid water. Her knees tremble violently as she stands up, licking lips which feel as dry as sandpaper, swallowing down a throat that is constricting, choking... she really does feel a little sick.  

“Would you care to tell me what’s going on?” Washington sounds thunderous, his voice tightly controlled and crackling with the tension of a storm.  

“I-” _Breathe, Hamilton, for Chrissakes get it together!_ “I’m fine. It just... it reminded me of...” trailing off, frowning, and gasping in surprise. Home is not the word she is looking for. _Home_ is inadequate when it comes to Nevis and St Croix. “...Back there,”

“Of course. That was insensitive of me,” And Washington understands. He nods, his face grave and still, eyes bright. “As long as this is not about yesterday evening?”

“No,” Hamilton lies through her teeth. For a moment she thinks she is off the hook, as Washington takes half a step backwards and his hands are no longer halfway up, as if waiting to catch her. She holds her breath tensely, waiting for Washington to leave. He has a lecture to finish; one which she won’t be sitting through any longer. Hamilton has a bed and a chocolate bar calling her name.

But Washington seems to think of something else.

“Hamilton, I have a student who once went through something similar to what I am witnessing with you—”

“Sir—” Hamilton tries to interrupt, but Washington keeps on speaking resolutely over her.

“—I would ask you to consider meeting them. Their name is Gilbert du Motier, and they would be more than happy to speak with you,”

“They?” that catches Hamilton’s attention. She is certain Washington is only talking about one person. He looks almost embarrassed for a second, his great, grounded surety thrown.

“Aha, yes, they. Gilbert is what I believe is called... transsexual? No, no- ah, yes, they are transgender, gender...” and that is when Hamilton’s brain roars and blood whirls past her ears, and she stops being able to focus. _Unnatural._ Part of her screams; the she born in a homophobic and closed-minded society. _Me._ Part of her whispers shyly. It is the long-buried _he_ part, slowly blossoming again in America. That quivering, trembling sensation is back, taking her entire body in its grasp this time.

“I have to go. Thank you for the offer, sir, but no thanks. I’m fine on my own,” Another lie. Another half-baked excuse. Still, there is no time to take it back as she turns and almost flees back down the stairs.

* * *

 

Tormented by thoughts and eager to escape the cloudy, darkling dreams haunting her sleep, Hamilton sits by their room’s one window and looks out at the silent campus. She slumps down into a hazy doze, barely dragging herself back from sleep every time it attempts to reclaim her. There is a dull thump, and for a moment Hamilton thinks that she is back in her room, the tax collectors screaming blue murder through the letterbox; then she is rushing back up through the fail skin of dreams, blinking, her sleep-fogged mind struggling to catch up with the pillow now sitting on her chest.

"Go to sleep, Mary," Eliza emerges from under her covers, her hair in a messy bun on top of her head, chocolate strands escaping in all directions. Her dark eyes are soft, and Hamilton feels a brief surge of hatred at the concern in her gaze again. When did Eliza last look at her with anything else? In that moment, eyes wide as they try to process the scenario and send it to Hamilton’s brain, she is painfully aware of the stillness. Angelica is sitting up, arms folded, staring at her. She probably threw the pillow.

 When Hamilton had curled up in the chair in the evening, the dorm had still been buzzing with students settling down for the night, spilling in and out of each other's rooms and making last-minute dashes to the communal bathrooms. Now it is almost entirely silent, and she doesn't remember when Angelica called for lights out- or- oh hell, when did the room get so dark?

“Do I have to?” She slowly gets to her feet, joints groaning as they slowly unbend from their cramped position. Angelica rolls her eyes, falling back onto her pillows with a long sigh.

“Mary, honey, it’s three AM. You are _so_ on coffee duty tomorrow for this,” Angelica pulls the covers over her head, and the definitive swish of the duvet mutes every other sound in the room. A new kind of silence falls and as Hamilton takes a moment to listen to Peggy breathing softly, and Angelica’s quiet, whistling snores which very soon return, she finally decides that it isn’t worth staying awake any longer. What more can she do? Eliza lies back down; her eyes watching as Mary slowly sits down on her own bed and kicks off her trainers, lying on her back with her arms behind her head.  She glances back over at Eliza, mouthing goodnight and hoping that the other can see through the gloom of the room.

That seems to be enough, because Eliza rolls over and Hamilton is left alone with her thoughts, and the slow, creeping morning light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whooo! Exams are over and I'm thrilled about it, namely because I get to bring you this short chapter which is probably filled with little mistakes because I'm tired and it was rushed. As always, comments fuel my soul, and kudos are nice too; so see you next time (hopefully soon). Also, if you check this story's subnotes at the end, you'll see that I have now set up an instagram account which supports this one, for minifics and preveiws, and also other odd little things like surveys and any contests I might hold.


	3. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Schuyler fluff, a guest appearance from two French monarchs and Hamilton finally opens up.

Angelica Schuyler. Angelica _goddamn_ Schuyler. Hamilton can just see her smug grin, her eyes sparkling with mirth, and the _I said you're on coffee duty, Mary_ that came with a coat being thrown over her head. Now Hamilton is struggling down the road through new-fallen snow, wearing the clothes she fell asleep in with her hair fought into a messy, last minute bun. Her breath comes out in a puff of crystals, toes cold inside her boots as the powdery crunch-crunch of footsteps in the snow fills her ears. She glances around and finds herself almost alone on the street, a bent figure hurrying past frosted shop fronts. Occasionally a car will make its cautious, growling way by, barely moving much faster than she on the snow-sludge road. Who else would be out on a morning like this? The newspaper boy and the men hurrying to work in grey suits, perhaps, but no sane American citizen would walk further than their mailbox unless they have to.

Unfortunately for Hamilton, she has to. The Schuylers are very particular about their coffee.

She can see King's at the end of the road, the little coffee place jutting curiously out from the line of houses, sign hung with icicles. There is the familiar crown over the apostrophe; the royal blue calligraphy. It is barely a three minute walk, but something else has made her feet stop, sinking into a snowdrift. Over the road, where the lights of Betsy Ross' design and stationary shop are slowly blinking awake, Hamilton catches sight of a poster being whipped thisaways and thataways in the knifing, biting wind. She shudders, squinting at the bright colours which had so startled her- unexpected as they are on this grey and white morning. She recognizes the rainbow design, the slogan encouraging readers to talk and call the number below if they need support. LGBT. She knows what those letters stand for; anyone who doesn't is considered ignorant among this generation- and yet she cannot help a sense of alienation creeping up her throat. Perhaps she would have crossed then, gloved fingers fumbling for her phone before she really registers what her mind is planning, but a door slams. It echoes in the silent morning wasteland.

"Monsieur Hamilton!" She is torn from her thoughts, her head whipping around to stare at Louis; who, amazingly, is awake before noon and running the shop himself. He stands in an apron, sleeves rolled up to his elbows and coffee is splashed over his expensive trousers. Tossing his head like a proud stallion, Louis firmly places his hands on his hips, "Marie has made you your coffee orders already, so come- come! What are you waiting for?"

"That was quick," Hamilton remarks, hurrying as fast as she dares in the treacherous snow. They slip into French, as per custom.

"Well, it is the same every Sunday," once inside, Louis claps his hands and his rings let out a silvery orchestra, flashing in the low light. Royally upholstered sofas line the walls, and mahogany tables scatter pleasingly. Not so close and to be cramped, but close enough for a social atmosphere.  
A social atmosphere, however, requires people; the shop is empty.

"Quiet morning?"

"Hamilton, when is it not?" And Louis laughs, because any other coffee shop owner would be scared stiff if their days went by in a week of quiet mornings. He laughs because he does not have to worry about money, or about clientele, regulars, or the fact that neither he nor his wife can bake the cakes they want to provide the select group who use this place. And Hamilton laughs too, because she loves it here and is forever in debt to Louis giving her the free cup of coffee which led to meeting Washington. "Ah, but have you heard the news? Sacrebleu! This snow will continue all week! And the boy who makes our cookies is off sick- sick, he tells me, but I am certain he has found better work elsewhere. Elsewhere, I say, where the coffee machine does not break! You know, if my father had not left this-" and then he is off, his declarations punctuated by at least three flying sugar sachets and the coffees being slammed down one by one.

Hamilton takes a seat, nodding vaguely. When Louis is like this- worked up, raging about how much he abhors being left this coffee shop by his father, taking on airs of royalty and ranting about various friends- it is best to let him continue.

"Not to mention, of course, more funds. Funds, Washington asks for. And I tell him my days of being a banker are over- but I laugh, of course he knows I will give him more,"

"More funds?" Hamilton looks up quickly.

"Oh!" Louis claps his hand over his mouth. "If he has not told you, I should not either,"

"We haven't had time to speak," Hamilton shrugs, leaning forwards.

"Well, not to spoil too much..." Louis trails off and winks, "but he is planning some form of debating set up, an open-mic kind of event. Something to do with rights... you know how it is, I don't pay too much attention,"

"You pay attention to nothing, that is my coffee you just wrote 'Margarita' on," Marie emerges from the back, arms crossed and proud eyes fixed on the coffee Hamilton was just cramming into the tray. Louis flushes right to the roots of his hair.

The next five minutes is spent fixing the coffee orders, and then Marie persuades Hamilton to try the newest attempt she and Louis made at a cake. Thankfully, Hamilton is saved from burnt edges and dry sponge by an irritated text from Angelica.  

“I have to go,” she says quickly, and rushes out into the bitter cold with the coffee- a fresh batch had been required, in the end- and the couple's farewells in her ears. Crunching her way back past the poster, Hamilton inhales the world which is gradually waking up; more cars pass, flashing by now, community workers gritting the roads and an old man in a trench coat shovels the drifts out from under passersby.  She smiles and moves on; campus is thrumming with the energy of students who know that the festive season is approaching and with it, exams. Papers and work pile up with the early snow. It serves as a reminder that Hamilton needs to hurry, and do so with an intense fervour.

She finds Angelica and Peggy in their room, both absorbe in their own activies: Peggy writing, Angelica doing a crossword. The latter had leapt to her feet even before the door slams shut behind Hamilton.

“You took your time,” Angelica says archly, grabbing her coffee off Hamilton before she can defend herself. She stares at the croissant doodled next to her name, and shrugs, sitting back down with far more grace.

“Louis was having a bad morning,” Hamilton shrugs and hands Peggy her drink before sitting on her bed with her own. Peggy snorts, glancing up with a sarcastic eyebrow raise; so, she successfully conveys most of her wordless response. Hamilton rolls her eyes. “Well, _worse than usual_. Coffee machine exploded in his face,” she ammends her earlier statement.m

“Did you film it?” Peggy looks up excitedly, almost losing her grip on her laptop. Angelica laughs, throwing the plastic top from her drink at Peggy like a discus without looking up from her crossword this time.

“I wasn't there-“ Hamilton ducks when Peggy's lid goes sailing over her head, and huffs in annoyance. To think, the youngest sister is like this without caffein, ever playing the child or the soul of wit- and it will only get worse once she has knocked back her mocha. Hamilton can only send up silent thanks that she won't be with her today.

"Settle down, children," Eliza's laugh breaks up the impending throwing war before it can begin, stepping through the door in a mint blouse and leggings. Her hair is in damp curls, framing her face and Hamilton's heart leaps. Flushing, she looks down and fiddles with the rim of her paper cup as a distraction. “Anyway, Mary, are you sure you don't want to come with us to see dad?”

“I have work to do...” Hamilton clears her throat. “Sorry, maybe next time, yeah?”

Peggy mutters something about Hamilton always having work and- _you can make time for more work but not us_ \- then Angelica is on her feet, and when Angelica decides to get moving, her energy is enough to spark a chain reaction. Eliza scoops her hair into a jade clasp pin, dropping everything down on her bed while Peggy grabs her bag. Hamilton sits in silence, cross-legged, and watches the familair arguement over whether Peggy should be allowed to bring her laptop, because  _isn't there a reason you have all those notebooks?_ and  _it's a family event, damnit!_ Which always makes Peggy laugh, and raise her delicately shaped eyebrows with a defiant look in her eyes. It is inevitable that she will win, and Eliza will stand there waiting by the door until Angelica swans out and, like flocking birds, they leave. Angelica pauses to wave goodbye, Peggy zips off down the hallway outside, and Eliza throws Hamilton a smile which makes her stomach flip. And then she is alone.

* * *

 

When she awakes the sun is high in the sky, pale winter light washing the room in a silver-yellow glow that makes Hamilton's eyes hurt and the foul taste in her mouth somehow worse. She must have dozed off, leaving her coffee on the nightstand. A dull thudding sound worms its way under her temples. The misery that haunts her in turns and swoops is knotting her insides again; it tries to fill the numbness, and the numbness consumes all. She wants to crawl back into the safety of sleep, but it is too late; her mind has started working again, and when has it ever stopped simply because she is tired?

Her stomach growls but neither the mini fridge nor the thought of the dining commons appeal to her. _Don't appeal to him_. Hamilton's stomach twists painfully. Tears sting her eyes and she tries to focus on the ceiling: the way it slopes, the spiderweb in one corner, counting the minuscule cracks and bluetac marks from previous students. It works. Her breathing slows before it can be caught up in the steam train of thoughts whirling around her head, ever faster, faster, and every new burst of panic stokes the mighty engine.  Counting, counting, seeing the poster from earlier and feeling the coolness of clammy sweat playing her spine. Perhaps it is time- time to be bold, to be brave, to finally accept that something is wrong.

Hamilton lurches up off her bed, taking Eliza’s laptop from where it lives in drawer of their nightstand. She gulps, screwing her eyes shut as the colours from the poster flash before her them again, and then the writing. A number. A _website_.

She taps it in with shaking fingers, and starts to do what she does best, what she has always done; the thing that, uiltimately, got her to America. Learning. Taking in paragraph after paragraph, article by article. The website is clear enough, and after a tense moment of her heart straining against her ribcage, she finally starts to follow a few of the links it provides. Hamilton knows parts of all this already. Gender identity, transitioning, being gay... none of it is exclusively new, but none of it has ever been presented like this, in a friendly light without curses and homophobic slurrs. Her head is spinning and before long she is on Tumblr, surfing help blogs and her head is awash with new words, new terms; knowledge, and knowledge is power, and this is a power she must have over herself. She needs to understand the emptiness, the numbness, the pure unfamiliarity of the body she sees when she looks down. So much has changed for her in America, so why not this? Why not tear out the new leaf? Why not burn the book, and begin an entirely different story? And if the book is burned, there will be nothing to stop Hamilton taking up a pen and re-writing; and to create something beautiful, it will take a power and a courage that is suddenly flooding from somewhere inside. It terrifies Hamilton. People died for ideas like this back on Nevis. People were _killed_. The voice is raw, it is demanding. It is an infant of an idea.

And the steamtrain is picking up speed, blowing along dark chambers and disturbing thoughts. And her breathing is caught up in it. _Thud_. Her heart screams in her ears. _Thud_. _Thud_. The words blur on the screen. _Thud. Thud. **Thud**_. Fingers on her pulse, counting the quickening beats as they push hot blood through her veins, sending blood in a roar to her ears, as the sobs tumble from her lips.

“Mary! Oh, Mary...” _Eliza_. Warm hands, a soft embrace; Elizabeth Schuyler and her superpowers. In a fluid movement, the laptop has been set aside and the two of them cling together. At first Hamilton wants to struggle and break away from Eliza's grasp, but it only tightens and those warm hands rub soothing circles into Hamilton's shoulders. Eliza asks no questions, demands no answers, simply holds Hamilton and reminds her how to breathe in soft whispers and gentle nothings, rocking her like a small child. Hamilton feels like a fragile bird fallen from the nest, and before long she has become uncoiled, simply crying silently against Eliza's blouse. Sobs fade away and tears are dried, until Eliza quietly lies Hamilton down and gets a bottle of water from their minifridge. "Do you want talk about it?"

"Yes- no-" Hamilton nurses the cool bottle between her hands, pressing her forehead to it and her heavy, swollen eyes.

"Hey, we have plenty of time. Peggy and Angelica are in the dining commons," Eliza takes Hamilton's hand, squeezing it gently, and Hamilton decides that as long as they can stay like this she will be alright. Eliza provides not only warmth, but also strength, and it is strength enough for Hamilton to clear her throat and start talking. She begins by detailing the anxiety which has been steadily mounting since Friday, and then talks about the poster, before backtracking and firmly inisting this is nothing new. This is not some rash decision, nor a phase. Eliza nods, and motions for her to continue. There are still things Hamilton cannot tell her about, things outside the enclosed compass of her American life, and although Hamilton is certain Eliza realises this, she does not press for more. Finishing with Washington's looming threat, Hamilton trails off and fiddles with the ends of her hair.

"It's all so much to take in, Eliza. It's like drowning all over again, you don't which way is up, which way is down, but you have to keep swimming- and- and I just- I want it to end... I want to breathe clear air," Hamilton leans against Eliza, who wordlessly slips an arm around her shoulders.

"You should meet with this Gilbert. It could provide answers, and remember, there isn't anything wrong about this. Nothing wrong with you, that is, and nothing wrong with Gilbert. You know I'm gay, and that's fine, and if that's what you are... so be it,"

"But that doesn't _fit-_ It doesn't- when I'm called Mary, when people say she, or a guy wolf-whistles because he's seeing breasts or when- when Jefferson makes those comments and none of that- it doesn't- it's not _me_ ," and Hamilton knows she should stop and slow down, take her time to breathe, but now that everything is coming out it will not stop. The _he_ will not stop. Eliza bites her lip thoughtfully, a little curl of her hair falling free from the clasp pin.

"Do you want to watch a movie?" the question is sudden, but Hamilton knows Eliza and so she knows there is something more behind it; something invisible at the moment, but it will soon be clear, no doubt. Hamilton nods, and Eliza rifles through her bag until she stands up with a plastic DVD case in her hands, "We picked up some of our old disney films from home, and this one was always Angel's favourite," Hamilton watches Eliza set up the movie on her laptop, shutting the website tabs Hamilton had opened without question.

Hamilton's confusion lasts only as long as it takes for the opening credits to roll on screen, and then she finds herself in tears once more; happy tears this time, tears of utter gratitude. Mulan. Hamilton has never seen it, but she knows the story, and so with her cheeks streaked and a tissue box on her lap, she settles back on her bed with Eliza and watches. Before long, Peggy and Angelica return and, rather than asking why Hamilton is crying, they simply squeeze themselves onto the bed as well and Angelica grabs her giant throw blanket, and together they snuggle down.

Three Schuylers and Hamilton, unrelated by blood but like siblings nonetheless, and Hamilton would be lost without them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly, this was so hard to write because some of it is so close to home. Anyhow, I absolutely adore writing as King Louis although I can't spell his name for biscuits and tend to make his character very similar to Louis from the Three Musketeers (my current read) completely by accident. Kudos and feedback appreciated, and until next time, adieu.


	4. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: self harm.  
> So I like to avoid long rants in notes but this also explains my absence and why I'm back. It's been a really hard slog through this fourteen-week term at school, caus the teachers crammed in mocks (Ten hour art exam, German coursework which was outstanding from last year when I had heatstroke AS WELL as this year's courswork so double workload etc) then college open evenings and interviews. It was really hard. Then I lost all enthusiasm and spent a lot of time working on my own orginal novel. BUT MOVING ON last night I had a very graphic and gritty nightmare about university/college and being put in the girl's dorms, attacked and cast out by fellow transpeople. It made me realise that for all the stuff online very little is said about the real, personal aspects of dysphoria and now I find myself back here determed to finish this two-part work. It may just be fanfiction but it'll be there for the people who need it, which is what matters, and after my gender clinic appointment I have the boost I need to keep on writing.

Hamilton has always hated mirrors. They make her look flat and fake, more of a washed-out cardboard figure than a real person; but this morning, some twisted impulse has driven her to use Peggy's hand mirror. She sits in a toilet cubicle, feet tucked up and bare toes curling around the seat, the edges of the mirror digging into her palm. A single blue eye stares back at her, framed in long eyelashes, a small glimpse of the bridge of her nose, freckles. Turning her head now, tilting the mirror, taking in strands of coppery auburn hair falling still damp around her narrow face and one corner of her fine mouth, turned down in a grimace. Everything is so feminine. There is the curve of her neck, the absence of an Adam's apple and the small splash of freckles across her collar bone- and below that-

Below that is more than she can bear to think about.

She can hear more girls coming into the bathrooms now, and somewhere a shower switches on. Someone squeals in surprise because the water is cold, someone else laughs. Panic rattles through Hamilton. For one breathless moment she feels like a peeping Tom; an outsider on the inside, where she really shouldn't be. _(A boy in the Little Girl's room)_ a niggling voice says, but she pushes it down and gets to her feet.

"Hey, Mary," Maria is outside, leaning against one of the sinks and peering at herself critically in the mirror. Hamilton watches how she carefully starts to apply mascara, almost transfixed by it and knowing that such femininity will never be for her. Smiling in greeting and slipping the mirror into the pocket of her jeans, Hamilton leaves before she can be roped into giving opinions on _is this too much mascara_ or _should I go with lipstick today?_ or, worst of all _would you like me to do your eyebrows? What about your eyeliner?_ because as nice as Maria is, and no matter how good she looks with her smokey eye makeup, Hamilton only has so much patience for the facade she finds herself putting on more and more often. Smiling, waving, going through the steps of how-do-you-do and very-well-thank-you as fast as she can.

Thankfully, nobody else is in the room so she returns Peggy's mirror and gathers her things. It is still cold outside: the wind from yesterday continues to rush around corners and tear papers from unsuspecting students' hands, whistling around the upstairs classrooms. Hamilton spends most of Psychology watching the snow fall and smiling softly to herself, because snow is such a new experience. _Seasons_ are a new experience, but snow is possibly the best part, even if she is sneezing by lunch time. The soft, white down of it. There had been a storybook, once upon a time... Hans Christian Anderson, a beautiful collection and illustrated in inks: little worlds bound in leather, her mother had called them. The debt collectors had taken it, though, but not without Hamilton comitting as much as possible to memory. The Snow Queen, The Little Mermaid. Anderson had been a bit like Hamilton, a bit like his mermaid... 

"Mary Hamilton." Martha calls. Hamilton takes that like a knife, head jolting up. The classroom is empty. A desperate flush creeps up her cheeks but the words won't come, won't even tumble out, as she stares up at Martha. When did the lesson end?  _God,_ she had been spaced out. 

"I-" 

"It's alright." Martha Washington smiles at her. "Here, you look like you could use this. Now run along." she smiles kindly, but it does little to reassure Hamilton. The plastic bag Martha gave her hangs heavy in her hands, as she hurries up the corridor. There is the sick dread, the sick knowledge, that Washington would no doubt have spoken with his wife. She knows. This is pity food. Hamilton is willing to bet her life on it.

Hamilton's footsteps slow on the carpeted floor, and she feels her shoulders slope. The mirror is cold in her pocket. Suddenly, Hamilton has no idea where she is going. This is the human sciences corridor, this is the floor she has walked a thousand times: between attending her classes and meeting Peggy in the English block, between going down the right hand turn to meet Angelica in biology before doubling back to join Eliza coming out of the Psychology B-group class. Every day, Mary Hamilton walks this way and Mary Hamilton is-

What? 

Not here. The strangest feeling starts to coil her insides.It is an old, old discomfort that goes all the way back to a first school classroom and two halves of students, a dozen sets of eyes burning into her from either side. _Boys this side, girls on the other- Mary, move!_ But the Mary then had not been able to move, much like now. She suddenly wants to scream, or shout, or tear at her skin and she  _just can't._ This is the busy human sciences corridor and soon there will be more people here. Her feet turn her about, and she runs. 

 

Later, how much so she cannot say, there is a heavy knocking on the dorm room door. It comes through to Hamilton from a very distant height. 

"Come in." she pulls herself up and looks around at the evening monochrome of the room. This keeps on happening. What would Angelica say? Eliza? One would snap in a strange, kind sort of anger designed to motivate, and the other would watch with doe-soft concern. Knuckling her eyes, Hamilton stands up. She begisn to wonder is there is somewhere she should have been. What day...

Friday.

"Hamilton, Washington said to leave you alone but Burr is so- have you been  _crying?"_ The question is mocking, southern trawl cutting. There is no care in Jefferson's face as he looks at Hamilton, the lithe cat and the bedraggled mouse. Hamilton's hair hangs greasy in her eyes and she tries to turn invisible under Jefferson's hard stare. "Dear me, I thought periods were only a week-" 

"Shut up." Hamilton's head jerks up. She doesn't need to be reminded, not of that impending week, not now and not by Jefferson. Thomas- _fucking_ -Jefferson. His eyes twinkle in amusement. "Shut the fuck up." Hamilton's hand is moving for Jefferson's face- and then he has her wrist in his hand, fingers pressing over the fresh red tracks up her arm. White, white pain flashes across her vision. White is good, it cleanses, but not when it is Jefferson holding her and trying to roll up her sleeve. Maybe he sees something of it in her face, in the hare-like flash that chases across her expression. One of fear, one of guilt. One that is all too easily readable, and the worst part is that for a moment Jefferson's eyes soften to something akin to sympathy and he looks nearly human.

"Mary!" 

"Hamilton?" 

Hamilton wrenches herself away from Jefferson even as he is pulling up her sleeve, turning over her hand to see the red skin caught under her bitten nails. By the time Eliza jogs up to join them, Peggy wrapping her arms around Hamilton to pull her back, the nail-marks are hidden. But they all hurt. The ones across her back, the ones up and down her arms.

For one beautiful moment, that fire had been back in his veins, in his thudding heart. Hamilton had stood to face Jefferson as an equal. He had been prepared to tackle all six feet of entitled dickishness and then Peggy was there calling  _her._ The discomfort which had been hard in her stomach since that morning's lesson congeals again. Washington is huffing behind Angelica, who is stalking towards Jefferson. The oldest sister looks ready to murder, her hand stinging across Jefferson's cheek. Her eyes burn, brighter than Hamilton's and far more controlled. It is a fire which might just rival the potential blaze already kindled in Hamilton's chest.

"Miss Schuyler. Miss Hamilton. Mr Jefferson. Break. This. Up. Club is cancelled this evening." Deep bass tones vibrating with oaken anger, and every single person in that circle of searing temper is cowed. Hamilton bows her head, hugging herself. Jefferson steps back slowly in an attempt to recapture his dignity. Only Angelica has managed to keep her steely dignity. She stands taller than her sisters, all three of whom are now around Hamilton. She has a protective flank front and sides, and a wall to her back; but even so, she feels so very vulnerable. Damn Jefferson and his hornets.

Once they have gone, Hamilton and Washington stand alone in the corridor. Hamilton looks up into that fatherly face and sees a commander, but also a leader, a helper. It does not make her feel better in the slightest.

"I..." Hamilton begins. A spike of pride, pale and bitter, pushes up inside her throat. It lasts just long enough to stop what she has to say, before she swallows it firmly down and scuffs socked feet on the carpet. Somewhere, a door shuts. Someone must have been listening, ears in every room and eyes at every keyhole; they are after a little gossip to feed the masses. "Sir, when can you get me to see this... Gilbert?"

Washington smiles.

* * *

Hamilton scrolls through Instagram, seated in _King's_ in one of the lovely armchairs. Loui's chatter makes nice background music. New York rumbles along outside, too, and it really helps Hamilton feel part of something for a change, nervous as she is. When the bell chimes, it makes her stomach flutter- but it is the French which gets her attention and prompts her to look up. Flawless, easy, confident: just like the young man talking. He stands there in the doorway, coat dusted with the snow. His hair is tied in a neat little ponytail, his- _hers?-_ or... no _, their-_ eye makeup is done to a level that even Peggy might call smokey perfection. Deep burghundy makeup artfully brings out fine lips, drawing away focus from the masucline jawline, albeit a fine one: Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette. Clear manicured nails tap on the counter as they order a coffee, and Louis' grin is so, so wide.

"Good morning." Gilbert smiles, taking a seat opposite Hamilton with a third man. Washington had said there may be another, and Hamilton's eyes track over this young man with wonder. He is fair: blonde hair and blue eyes and a smudge of sunshine yellow paint just on the tip of his nose. He holds a sketchbook under one arm and the shirt he wears is a Rolling Stones one under a worn-in aviator jacket. If Gilbert is immaculate, this Laurens must be his opposite.

"Hamilton. Am I calling you Mr, Miss... something else?" Gilbert adds.

"You're wayyy too polite, Laff." Laurens rolls his eyes and leans forwards, grabbing Hamilton's free hand and shaking it enthusiastically. "John Laurens. Call me John, everyone else does. You're _the_ Hamilton, right? Wash' mentions you, like, all the time. I'm gonna call you Hammie." and then John is leaning back again, leaving Hamilton completely swept away by those blue, blue eyes. They are an ocean in colour and, Hamilton can already guess, in temperament.

"Yeah- that's fine. Not that you were asking me if that was fine, anyway-" an awkward laugh, a dull realisation that she is on the edge of rambling her way into senselessness, "-but, uh, I... couldn't tell you, what title. Mr. I think- it's not- well, I've only watched Mulan and read some stuff, well, kinda just reiterated things I've been feeling for years-"

"Laff." John says, looking up from his phone, "I want to keep this one." the statement is delivered bluntly with a disarming, oh-so-charming smile. Gilbert laughs.

"Mr Hamilton, you must excuse John. He is a... hyperactive puppy. Just hit him on the nose or spray him with water when he gets too much, d'accord?"

"D'accord." Hamilton has to smile despite himself. Gilbert looks delighted, a slight dimple rising in each cheek when they grin at the return of the coloquial French.

"Oh, mon amis, I believe we must keep this one." They declare, nudging John slightly in the ribs. "But come, Hammie, you must tell us what things have been reiterated, as you put it."

Maybe it is the twinkle in Gilbert's eyes or the warmth radiating from John's smile, but some force compells Hamilton to open his mouth. And talk. And _really_ talk, that is. Louis serves coffee, all on the house, and at some point comes to lean over the back of John's chair as he listens. Hamilton does not mind, not really, since Louis is as good a friend as any. She talks about the fights with Jefferson, the jabs and how they make her feel. Hamilton tells them about the confusion which swooped down on her in early puberty and did not leave, nestling down in the forefront of her mind to stay- ( _"Hammie, we've all been there. Don't worry. It'll get evicted soon."_ John laughs out gently)- and she even mentions the need to claw away this stupid, stupid body. Lafayette, as they re-introduce themself, takes her hand at this point and gives it a genlte squeeze. Almost, so very _nearly,_ she talks about the skirt and the classroom. But that is the Carribean and she will never, ever go back to that. Not with people whom, despite how she trusts them already, she really barely knows.

When the group leave, with hugs and cookies from Louis, and John delving into excited conversation with Hamilton over quirky music artists- ( _"The Divine Comedy. Yeah- I know, he's great! And OMAM-" "Yes!")-_ Hamilton barely thinks back to that morning, the scared little girl on the toilet seat forgotten. Outside the campus, Gilbert slings an arm around Hamilton's shoulders and slips their number into his pocket, smiling.

"Do not worry, mon amis. There is no rush to change, no matter how you feel. You will get there in the end, and it will be wonderful. Every step on the journey is enriching." They tell Hamilton, so sincerely that he almost tears up again. _He._ That is still a very private thing in his mind, but Hamilton likes the steadying weight of the pronoun in his thoughts. Lafayette told him to experiment now, and that he will most certainly do.

"Thanks, Laff." Hamilton shakes that smooth hand again, and then takes John's. John is a bit gangly too, much like Hamilton, and his hands are large and warm. Firm, but with slender fingers made to hold a pencil. Hamilton will get to see inside the sketchbook, _if_ he comes to the LGBT group meeting in King's next thursday. So of course, he promises he will- and, yes, he will also listen to Amos Lee in the meantime. Still laughing, Hamilton heads back up to his dorm.

Only at the last minute, does he realise his feet almost took him in the direction of the boy's dorm.


	5. Chapter Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We meet Herc, Jefferson is an arsehole (but he's actually a hurt smol) and Louis is too good, too pure, cinnamon roll.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to the commenters and the kudos-ers! Here I am with one chapter for you guys and it was entirely prompted by Bubbly_Kandy's yelling in a comment a couple of days ago. It really made me smile  
> (Also I can't stop seeing Benjamin Franklin as Morgan Freeman and Hercules Mulligan as Shemar Moore... just a random thing I thought I'd share)

 

Hamilton is frozen. Not the cold-down-to-his-bones frozen, but an emotional suspense sort of frozen; he is caught, completely and utterly trapped, between his rattling nerves and his thrilled determination. His palm is slick with sweat as he grips the doorhandle to the debate room. Burr is already inside with Angelica; he can hear their banter being lobbed across throw blankets and pillows. All he has to do is walk in and _say it._

 Up and down in the bedroom he paced all morning, going over his introduction with Eliza. She cut his hair for him, trimming back the straggling fringe and cutting the back until just a little remained in a ponytail; she then sat him down, and began to talk him through coming out. Even when his heartbeat rocketed in his chest and the panic-train began to run down its old, well worn tracks, Eliza kept him going. She was right; she always is. Elizabeth Schuyler and her healing hands, her soothing voice: her super-power of always having the right answer. He will do this for her, or he won't do it at all.

  
"Hey." Hamilton steps into the room with a hefty smile. It weighs heavily on his face, and aches to maintain, but he holds it up nonetheless.

"Nice haircut." Burr remarks after the most fleeting of glances, returning to laying out snacks with the methodic pace he applies to everything. Angelica purses her lips and crosses her arms. There is a challenge there. Just tell him, that look screams; just spit it out. Angelica does not allow for second thoughts or turning back, and Hamilton only has a small window of time. Jefferson will arrive soon. He pushes air through puffed cheeks and wipes his palms subconsciously on his baggy jeans.

 "Burr, I- I don't think we've been properly introduced." Hamilton starts slowly, and then catches his breath in one exhilarating moment. Before Burr can say anything, before that look of confusion can turn into a question, Hamilton is speaking again: "I'm a boy. I am transgender. It's Hammie now, or, just until I can find a preferred name; and I just thought you should know." Every line falls in a chaotic tumble from Hamilton's mouth. 

Burr says nothing.

"Was I... talking too fast?" Hamilton demands, voice rounding off at a nervous pitch he detests.

Burr shakes his head. Panic swells in Hamilton's throat.

"Want a pretzel... Hammie?" Burr asks solidly, and holds the packet out. Relief catches Hamilton square in the chest. 

"Oh, thank God. I thought-"

"Hey." Burr shoves the packet right in Hamilton's face, and he has to stop talking or eat plastic wrapping. "Stop that. We see each other about twice a week. I'm not your friend, so don't start blubbing on me, okay? I still think you're a loudmouth idiot, just a male loudmouth idiot now."

"You're the _worst_ , Burr." Hamilton snorts, tossing a handfull of pretzels at him. A low, playful smile just about tugs one corner of Burr's mouth.

"Why, thank you." He replies, and bows stiffly.  

The door bangs then, footfalls breaking the quiet. 

 "Evenin'." Jefferson drawls. He sweeps into the room so suddenly: like some malignant wraith, his lanky body peeling from the deepening shadows by the door. His gaze alights on Hamilton, then Burr, and finally the snack table. "I love gettin' here early." He says casually, throwing his body onto the sofa and still making it look like a graceful tumble. His limbs land in an artful sprawl: long arms, legs going on forever, wicked smile plastered over everything.

"Someone's conversational." Angelica remarks dourly, her words a caustic grate against even Hamilton's ears- and the venom is not directed at him.

"Shut it, Schuyler." Jefferson rolls his eyes. "As I was saying. I love gettin' here early. You get the best snacks, the best spot on the couch. You even..." he stretches, cat-like, and yawns with a mouth full of cannibal-teeth. "-get the couch to yourself, for a bit. And best of all-" a single finger is held up, the breath in the room suspended on that single digit, "-you hear all the interesting news. Wouldn't you agree, _Hammie_?"

 The determination built in Hamilton's heart shatters. Every yarn of suspense is held in that moment- a single, perfect freeze-frame of a moment- spinning a chrysalis in which an old enmity has been forming. It all comes from spilled coffee and stained notes, from eyes locking across a tense classroom, and now it is spiked with fear. Jefferson has his hornets. Hamilton has a secret. Angelica's rage is gathering up like a blinding silver aura all around her. Hamilton knows that he has to say something before she ticks over into a shouting match with Jefferson. 

"If you say anything-" Hamilton starts, voice gravel in a raw throat.

And Washington walks in, muttering a storm to himself about marking. He sucks the impending fight out of the room like a vacuum created by a sudden change in air pressure. Hamilton collapses onto his beanbag in a downdraft of anxiety, and Jefferson is carried up on a giddy, gleeful breeze.

 "Is... everything okay?" Washington asks, dumping his bag down on his desk. He has a look in his eyes like a man who missed the opening of a play and does not realise it. The rest of the group are filtering in after him.

 "Yeah." Hamilton makes himself shrug, hollow puppetshrug as it is, and finds that the ingredients on the pretzel packet are suddenly immensely interesting.  Jefferson's eyes are boring into him, and once again the room is starting to shrink. All Hamilton can do is wait it out. 

 He is up like a jackrabbit when Washington says it is time to leave. Burr and Angelica had handled the session, and Hamilton just stumbled along listlessly to their tune. They said nothing. They just shot venomous glares at Jefferson. 

 "Hamilton?" Jefferson snags his arm as they start to head back across campus. Eliza and Angelica look, for one moment, as if they are ready to fight on Hamilton's behalf, but move along rather than make a scene in front of Washington. Hamilton has to thank his few lucky stars that they have more sense than he does. 

 "What?" 

 "If you're gay, don't... glorify yourself. Don't lie to yourself." Jefferson says, and in those eyes is a sincerity: deep, real concern. It brings revolsion that rises in Hamilton's throat like gorge, and he yanks his arm back. _His._ Jefferson has no idea what he is talking about, but the Virginian believes every single bullshit-dropping he delivers. "You'll make a choice you regret, Hamilton. You're making a fool of yourself." 

 "I never had you pinned as a transphobe." Hamilton says flatly. 

 "That's because I'm not. I just don't think that you're doing the right thing. It's wrong." 

  _Wrong. Freak. Move, Mary. Pick a side of the room._

_Pick._

_You freak._

_(Do we remember the playground, Hammie?)_

"No, you're wrong." Hamilton tells Jefferson, surprising himself with the steel in his voice. "Now I have somewhere to be." He pulls himself up and, calling on some inner reserve of Angelica-esque strength, strolls around the corner. He immediately breaks into a run once he is out of Jefferson's sight. 

 Jefferson's gaze keeps on playing before his eyes. The concern in it cut deep, but there had been something else... another Jefferson, a fractured one. It was the one Hamilton saw last Friday outside the dorm room when Jefferson came looking for him: it was a certain kind of empathy around the eyes, the kind that could only come from the understanding of a shared experience. It had been haunting Hamilton all week, and now the ghost has grown. He cannot ignore it, and so he runs. 

 The snow is turning to sludge and it creeps over his, her

_(oh, who cares?)_

boots as Hamilton sprints along the slippery path. Twice he goes down into the gravel and greying mush; he does not feel it. His legs are pumping on a long shot and a stupid hope; it is late, and Friday, and King's has unpredictable closing hours. But Hamilton needs comfort. Hamilton needs something that comes from outside the sphere of college life: outside the rumour mill Jefferson will no doubt be feeding. 

 

King's is awake and buzzing with the sort of afternoon atmosphere only a coffee shop could retain after dark: Winter is not allowed past the door; Louis keeps it at bay with mellow jazz and the cranked-up heating. The warmth rolls lazily over Hamilton as he,

_(She)?_

, stands in the doorway feeling rubbed down to a raw, emotional nub.

 "Hamilton!" Louis cries, and sweeps the younger man into a crushing hug. Before he knows what is happening, both cheeks have been kissed and he is being spun into a chair next to the humming radiator. "You look frozen. Sacrebleu- and blue I say, for your mouth looks a shade near that colour! Sit, and- oh, here, drink." Louis snatches a coffee from his wife's hands as she heads past to the only other person in the cafe. She huffs and stomps back to the counter, leaving a very bewildered Hamilton to nurse the cup between his hands. His fingers and palms sing with the heat. 

 "Louis..." he begins, rolling the mug between his hands and flexing them to shake off the stiffness. 

 "Non. Non. You will not speak, my little friend. You will drink coffee, and you will warm yourself." Louis admonishes lightly, leaning forward to chuck Hamilton affectionately under the chin, before pushing the cup back into his hands. "For my little friend comes running here and I know something must be wrong, and I say to myself- 'Louis, help him. _Him',_ I say and then 'But Louis, you are incompetent in many things- including coffee and comfort.' Do you know what I conclude? I conclude that I will offer both coffee and comfort and cheer my favourite friend with my incompetence."

 "It is of comedic proportions." Marie adds as she comes to lean over the back of Louis' chair. Hamilton has to crack a pale smile at that, which prompts Louis to clap his hands gleefully in a glittering jangle of rings. 

 "See? You smile, and now you may speak." 

 "It's just... a lot. Everything." Hamilton says loosely, "I feel like, like- I just needed to get out of the college for a bit." 

 "You have strength, Hamilton. Louis and I admire you for acting on who you are, who you should be." Marie pats his hand where is has come to rest on the coffee mug. "And if you stay true to that, all will be well in the end." 

 "You think?" Hamilton asks quietly, shifting back in his seat and picking at a half-frayed hole in his jeans. 

 "If I did not believe that, I would not be perservering with this coffee shop venture." Marie smirks at him. Louis looks wounded. Hamilton cannot help himself: he bursts into laughter. 

* * *

 Saturday had been a distant dreampoint all week; a day that had become unusually exciting in Hamilton's eyes. It could not come fast enough, and now it is here, he wishes that it had never arrived. Jefferson had roiled the certainty Hamilton felt, and left him wondering what the everloving point of this whole thing could be. He was just going to a group, a group where they would talk and he would listen, and spend the whole hour swallowing down his anxiety. Maybe he should go back? He scuffs his trainers through the snow and blows into frozen hands, grappling with his choices.  _You'll make a choice you regret, Hamilton._

 Well, he hardly had a good track record of making smart choices. 

 "Hammie!" John calls as Hamilton approaches the building, jogging up alongside him and flinging an arm around his shoulders. He is wearing a Supernatural shirt today and a Hufflepuff beanie with a pair of clumpy boots, and a blinding grin easily lights up his entire face. A guitar is slung over his back, while in his other hand he clutches an art portfolio as if it is his dearest possession. This gets swung around and almost knocks Hamilton over as John spins on his heel into a sweeping, clumsy bow. "Welcome to our first official meeting. It's a nice place, don't you think?" 

 Hamilton raises an eyebrow and gazes up at the shabby store which stands, squat and detached from the rest of the buildings on the street, like some crabbed concrete monster. A neon sign weakly flickers a declaration of "We buy and sell second hand DVDs, vidoes, games and music". The sign advertising an upper-story room for rental still stands outside, a crude "sold" spray-painted across it in sunshine yellow.

 "It's... passable." Hamilton says archly.

 "Well don't tell Herc. He owns the shop. -Hey, you look tired."

 "Yeaaah." Hamilton rolls the syllable over on his tongue and shrugged. He had stayed late with Louis and Marie, helping them to clear up, and then spent the night catching up on last-minute papers to free Saturday from any work that needed to be done. Giving John and sheepish smile, he absently rubs his eyes.

 John straightens up and scampers ahead to the wooden steps hugging the outside of the old shop, only pausing once he has cleared them two at a time and reached the platform outside the door. 

 "Well, you coming?" He asks and Hamilton shields his eyes against the snowglare, gazing up at John framed in the white sunlight. 

 "Uh- yeah, yeah." Hamilton shakes himself into action, following John into the upstairs room. 

 Gilbert and a man Hamilton does not recognize are sprawled in the middle of a stripped wooden floor on a rug that has definitely seen better days, their legs flung over one another. Betsy Ross from the stationary store is sitting on a plastic chair, and John tugs a beanbag from the corner into the center of the room to join them. Unsure quite what to do, Hamilton drifts over and settles cross-legged next to John. 

 "You've met Laff, our resident genderqueer moneybags. That's Herc- Hercules Mulligan- our gentle giant, and then-"

 "Ms Ross." Hamilton smiles at the old woman, who nods her head.

 "-New York's lesbian fossil." John grins, and Mrs Ross rolls her eyes and slides a small Tupperware container across the floor to Hamilton. She is a quiet lady who holds herself with the dignity of age, even though her hands are becoming gnarled and her left shoulder slightly bent. 

 "No chocolate brownies for you, John. Help yourself, Hamilton dear. Laff must have taught you how to handle John- hit him on the nose, please. I would but I'm a dear old woman and he is so far away." 

 Hamilton rolls his eyes and leans up, flicking John's nose before settling back to take a chunk of brownie. He then slides the box along to Herc, who tucks in happily with Gilbert. John pouts. 

 "So, Hamilton. Have you thought about a name?" Herc asks, with a familiarity that leaves Hamilton unable to think of him as anything _but_ 'Herc'. As if they are already friends. Hercules Mulligan is an impressive figure. Dark-skinned with hazel eyes and the build of an oak tree, he lounges quite conentedly and still manages to look intimidating. Everything he is wearing could be second hand, from the paint-spattered Hollywood Undead shirt and grey fingerless gloves to his ripped combat trousers and trainers. The faintest lilt of an Irish accent underlays his words. Hamilton decides that he likes him straight away: rugged and thrown-together, Herc is a tree finding new roots. Not unlike himself.

 "Not... really." Hamilton replies slowly. 

 "You could always ask your mum what she would have named you, if you were assigned male at birth." John suggests. It takes a lot of effort on Hamilton's part not to physically wince at that suggestion, well meant as it is. 

 "Uh, actually..." Hamilton scratches the back of his neck awkwardly, meeting John's curious gaze. Those blue eyes are so light and full of an innocent kindness. He had really wanted to help, and Hamilton does not want to sour the atmosphere in this curious little place. "Yeah, I could. So... is this it?"

 "Ah!" Gilbert jumps up, "Mon amis, this _it_ will become more, just you wait and see. We want to create a safespace, a place where all people can come and have fun. A gay bar is one thing and we can find many of those in this city, but what of the younger ones? And the risk: the three of us have had far too many clashes, Herc more than John and I put together. Not to mention, Ms Ross would never go to a gay bar, would you?" They tilt their head at the older woman. 

 "Oh no, I think that is rather past me." She chuckles.

 "It's a brilliant idea." Hamilton starts slowly, "But... do you have the money for it?" 

 Gilbert's enthusiasm crumples. 

 "Well..." he starts.

 "Kind of." John adds. 

 "Not to spare, no." Ms Ross admits, and fiddles with the clasp of her handmade bag. 

 "I'm a pauper, don't look at me." Hercules shrugs. 

 "I guess that's why I ended up here, then." Hamilton cannot keep the excitement from seeping into his voice, "'Caus I used to do accounts back home; I know my way around banking, and how to write letters to persuade people. I'm also good at finding the people we need to persuade, and bugging the hell out of them until they cave. What have you been doing?" 

 There is a long silence. John looks at Gilbert, who looks at Ms Ross, who stares at Herc, who then raises his eyebrows accusingly at John all over again.

 "Busking." John says. Hamilton flicks him on the nose again. 

 "Idiot." He grins at the other man. "It's a good idea, but you're an idiot. You need to get planning permission, you see; and then set up a funding account at the bank. Also, I think that Washington is hosting some sort of event, and I could get him to promote us there. I mean, he doesn't know I know what he's planning yet, but..." The four share a glance. John stands and pats Hamilton on the head.

 "I told you we had to keep this one, Gil."

 "That you did." Gilbert grins. 


	6. Chapter Five

 

 

 

Hamilton walks back with John through the sinking afternoon. The grey day has simmered down into a brilliant gold; a winter's swansong. John dances through the dapples of sunlight where they lie between buildings, caught for a moment in his own world built from fractured sun and ice. Hamilton watches, trailing behind as the other man runs ahead. John leans up on his tiptoes as if he is about to take flight and snaps a photograph of the ochre orb hanging within intricate coils of mist and city smoke, before stumbling back into his liesurely way of walking. Each leg swings a moment before hitting the ground as if he is a carefree puppet escaped from cut strings. He cuts a strange figure in the middle of an eerie-still street, in his aviator jacket and spray painted boots, with his guitar case and portfolio. Hamilton smiles, feeling a thrill run down his spine.

John then jumps onto a low wall and walks along it: aeroplane arms and pointed toes. 

"You could have been a ballerina in another life." Hamilton remarks. John grins back at him. 

"Bitch, please." He curtsies and taps his heels, "I'm a great ballerina in this life." 

Hamilton laughs and jogs to catch up, walking alongside John with hands in pockets. 

"Want me to take that?" Hamilton snatches the portfolio from John and hangs the strap from his shoulder when it almost hits him in the face a second time. John flips him off, eyes dancing with a cornflower smile.

 Silence spans between them for a while, deep and easy. They have a common spark, he and John, one that goes beyond music and fandoms. Not that Hamilton knows what it is. He just feels comfortable around John. It took him so long to get used to the three Schuyler sisters, and he never adjusted to their brothers despite a Christmas, a Thanksgiving and a few weekends spent in their company. There is just _something_ about the wild, spooling sunlight-mess that is John Laurens. "So, I've never seen you on campus." Hamilton ventures at length. 

"I live in an apartment off campus, with Laff. And when I'm not living there, I'm living in the arts department: it has a coffee machine, a kettle, a microwave and all the pot noodles you could want. As for Wash, he does night classes on current politics, and that's my guilty pleasure." John throws out a lascivious wink. Hamilton utters a quiet 'ew' under his breath. 

"Well, that explains it. All artforms that aren't writing just sort of... repel me. Or I repel them- and my nights are for sleeping, you know how it is? I can't draw, and the last time I picked up a bottle of paint, it exploded." Hamilton admits sheepishly, and John chuckles. He talks with his hands as much as his voice, Hamilton is learning; they are moving now, sketching out ideas in the air as if his steamroller way of talking is not enough. 

"Hammie, you gotta come visit me in my second home. I can make you coffee and prove to you that anyone can make some level of art. Art's whatever you make it; so is life, and all that shit. Lemons and all- but you're squeezing the lemons back in life's eyes and it's brilliant to watch." 

"I... am?" Hamilton asks weakly, bewildered. 

"Yeah, you and Herc. But I never knew Herc before, so, it's cool to watch the metamorphosis. Like, life makes you one thing and you flip it the bird."

"Wait, Herc-" Hamilton cannot quite believe it. 

"Yeah!" John looks sidelong at Hamilton, jumping down from the wall. "Aw don't worry, you'll get to where Herc is. Apparantly, everyone thinks they won't, but they do. It's early days. You're still a chrysalis and Herc is this great big Atlas Butterfly." 

"And what will I be?" Hamilton cocks his head. 

"Agraulis vanillae. All vibrant and orange, and tiny." John pats Hamilton's head, "Small, but don't underestimate them." 

"Oh, thanks." Hamilton rolls his eyes. "I didn't think you'd be a butterfly nerd, Laurens." 

"I am King Nerd. Up here," John taps one temple, "I have a plethora of myriad knowledge. Most of it is thoroughly useless, and I keep it all." 

Hamilton stares at the other man. The intellectual flare has taken him off guard, and it tugs at him like a hook in his gut. He spent Mary's childhood yearning for someone as intellectual as him on every level- yearning for someone like John. 

"I'm a law and psychology student who can recount every Chinese dynasty and every Greek myth. You want to talk to me about having a head full of useless knowledge?" He teases. 

"Man, you should _so_ meet Mr Franklin. He's my art professor, but before that he was some bigshot politician who was flyin' up there in Congress. And before that, he spent his college years reading philosophy and getting a degree in mathematics with a dream of having a newspaper. Dude knows people, and he knows stuff. If he likes me, he'll like you." 

"Arrogant, much?" 

"I know I am." John smirks, shoving his hands in his pockets in a mirror of how Hamilton is walking. They ease back into silence, and Hamilton watches the dying crystals of snow turning into meltwater on the toes of his soaked trainers. A content smile keeps twitching one corner of his mouth. 

"I'm sorry. About your mum." John says suddenly. Hamilton blinks at him in confusion, head snapping up from his shoes "You paused, when I said you should ask her, and I know that pause. She's either dead, or you don't see her anymore and either way, I'm really sorry man."  

Hamilton gazes at John. He does not need to ask how John figured it out: you cannot have light without darkness, or so the cliche goes. A swell of empathy fills his heart. 

"I'm sorry, too." Hamilton replies and touches John's shoulder fleetingly, trying to convey warmth and understanding through the tips of two fingers as he passes the portfolio back. 

They step apart regretfully, but halfway back along the path Hamilton stops.

"Hey, Laurens?" He calls.

"Yeah?" John looks back. 

"We're talking butterfly philosophy and sharing sadness, but I don't even know your favourite colour." 

"Yellow." John's brilliant grin is visible from where Hamilton stands. 

 

* * *

 

 

Hamilton refuses to tell Angelica, Peggy or Eliza anything about his day. Angelica and Eliza put on their good cop, bad cop routine; Peggy is just abraisive. It makes Hamilton laugh, but he refuses to share anything else, because he wants to keep what he found today private. He found John- lightdancer, impish and yellow, a kindrid spirit patched together by many nuances- and he found a rundown club built on dreams. Dreams, he knows from firsthand experience, can take you a long way. Martin Luther King had a dream, and he built a following. He began to build a future. That, _that,_ Hamilton thinks with a buzzing conviction, is exactly what I will do. 

But for all his thoughts of dreams, sleep evades him. Peggy is snoring softly, sprawled on her back with the blankets flung on the floor. Eliza and Angelica's gentle breathing comes in waves, in a giving swash and small backwash.  He turns over, yanking his covers higher above his head.

Every time he shuts his eyes, he sees John running ahead, aviator jacket billowing in the stiff winter breeze, a single figure lit from the inside. 

Turning onto his back, he cradles his head on one arm and gazes up at the familiar cieling. Like reams of old film, it wavers and flickers, until he is seeing the eaves from his cousin's house. Hamilton blinks. The moment passes. His head is buzzing with ideas and he blames that; Mr Franklin could be a good place to start if he wants to get the club up and running for his newfound friends. 

Sleep would also be a good place to start.

The clock rolls over to three AM. 

He shuts his eyes, and allows John's light to draw him gently down. 

 

When he wakes, the snow has returned with a vengeance. It skirls across campus. Students hug walls and corners,  or avoid going outside at all, and the cafeteria is more full than it has ever been in Hamilton's time here. A group of senior students have gathered at a table near the middle, and Hamilton recognizes Seabury as well as Charles Lee and Thomas Conway. Conway is weilding a microphone. Hamilton edges in with Peggy shoving between his shoulder blades insistently. 

"Ignore them... Come on, Ham. I want pancakes. You want pancakes? Oh, of course you do. They're brilliant. Hey look, there's a cute boy trying to get your attention-" Peggy breaks off suddenly, and points at where John is weaving between the thronging students. 

"Heya, stranger." John punches Peggy lightly on the arm, and then leans his elbow on Hamilton's head. 

"Right back at you, Laurens." Hamilton swats him away, and suddenly finds himself at least a foot off the ground. Strong arms are wrapped around his waist, and a deep laugh rumbles in his ear. "...Herc?" Hamilton tries to twist free, his heart singing in his chest at the shock of it. 

"Oui, and Gilbert." Gilbert says. Hamilton's feet are firmly placed back on the ground, leaving him free to whirl on the group that have just cornered him so rudely. Peggy's laughter floats above them, warming the air. She tosses her curls and high-fives John, the sound crisp and clear and matching perfectly with their smug grins. 

"You two know each other?" Hamilton asks.

"Well, we kind of sit next to each other in the same art class." Peggy says dryly, "But, uh, no- no, we don't know one another. Do we, John?" Her voice is slick with sarcasm. 

"Uh... no, I don't think we do, Pegs." John shakes his head. 

"This is a long way from the arts department." Hamilton points out. 

"We were looking for you." Hercules cuts in, "Or, I was. And these jokers tagged along. Come on, I got breakfast. John can get more, can't you, John?" 

John walks off grumbling about grunt labour. 

"What?-" 

"Okay, sit down." Gilbert tugs Hamilton to the only free table. Peggy promptly plonks herself onto Herc's lap to make up for the lack of chairs, and Gilbert perches on the corner of it. 

"John doesn't want us to tell you this," Herc starts slowly, "because he wants you to feel like you're safe to do what you want. But John's been weirdly sheltered, even with his bastard father; I haven't been quite so lucky." Hamilton shifts uncomfortably, and Peggy's quiet 'ooo' dies away. They both catch the tenor of Herc's comment: it is thick, and heavy, and so very serious. With a very deliberate manner, Hercules carefully examines the room and then looks back to Hamilton. 

"Do not look so scared." Gilbert ruffles Hamilton's hair. Peggy leans her elbows on the table and stares at Hamilton with her brown eyes doe-wide. He can read the rest of Herc's story in them, even before the other begins to talk again. People often forget how intuitive Peggy is beneath her bold exterior, not entirely unlike John with whom she is apparently such good friends.

"Oh, shit- no, I don't want to scare you, but... be careful, okay? I was a student here, and things got rough when I started to transition. Especially-" Hercules licks his bottom lip and tilts his head in the direction of Seabury and his group, "-if you get my drift man. They were only first years, but..."

"Seabury lives in George King's pocket, and that means he can protect Conway and Lee." Peggy comments with surprising venom. 

"I wish someone would knock Seabury down a peg or seven." Hamilton mutters into his half-curled fist. "What's he up to, anyway?"

The four of them turn to look at where Seabury has stepped up onto a table. He clears his throat pointedly into his megaphone and the noise rends the chatter and general hubub in two. People stop to look. Half a cafeteria away, John stops with the tray and turns to look. 

"Terrance Bartow." Seabury says into the megaphone, dripping each syllable off his tongue as if he is tasting something bitter. Hamilton immediately tenses. "Or rather, that's how he used to be known. Now he has decided that he wants to be called Theodosia, and move into the girl's dorm."

A ripple of murmurs spreads out across the room. Seabury grins smugly: he has cast a stone and the reaction is growing; all he needs to do now is to cast a few more to be sure double sure. There is a crash as John drops the tray that he was holding, sending milk and cheerios rolling in all directions. But nobody is looking at him. Their eyes are scouring the room for Ter- Theodosia, _Theodosia-_ who is sitting in a far corner with Maria lewis and Jacques Marcos Prevost. Hamilton only has to follow their gazes to see Theodosia shrinking down in her chair, to see Maria shifting as if to physically place a barrier between them and Prevost getting to his feet with a look of disgust on his face.  

Blood roars in Hamilton's ears, and just like that the firebrand lion that had been lost for so long in a confusion-sloom is waking in his chest. He is deaf to Gilbert's plea, numb to Herc's reaching hand. 

"Seabury!" Hamilton says firmly. Somewhere to his left in the stirring sea of students, Burr's voice rises: " _Leave it alone, Hamilton."_

Shit, does this man ever say anything else?

"You want to out someone, Seabury, look no further." He says, and it does not occur to him that he is running head-first into a pan of boiling water. He just wants to get those eyes off Theodosia, whom Hamilton has long admired in Psychology lessons. Hamilton would not have passed the mid-year testing if it wasn't for him, her, _her._

Hamilton does not recall stepping up onto the table, but he is now level with Seabury and close enough to see every pockmark on his spiteful face. 

"I don't fight girls." Seaburry says coolly. 

"Good thing I'm not one." Hamilton spits back. Conway and Lee's background sniggers fade away into the boiling reaction of the watching students. Some are cheering, some are jeering, and some are scrambling to make a hasty exit. 

"Oh, it's like that?" 

"Yeah." Hamilton draws himself up to his full height, and his anger gives him a whole head on Seabury. As he begins speaking again, a deathly hush grips the hall. The only sound is the wind outside, rattling up a panicked gale against the doors and windows. "Why should you dictate on anyone's life, Seabury? You may think you're untouchable, but that isn't a reason. We're all human here, and last time I checked it is a basic human right to have accommodation and acceptance. It is also a duty of this college to create a safe environment in which we can learn." 

"Oh, Mary." Seabury simpers, "I used to have some respect for you. But it looks like that French faggot and Helena Mulligan have corrupted you, and Laurens. How nice to see he's left Franklin's apron strings, by the way."

"How sad to see you're still all tied up in George King's." Hamilton responds quickly.

A collective 'ooo' goes up.

"Want some ice for that, Seabury?" Peggy yells. Hamilton does not hear any of it.

"The Lord will judge you." Seabury says smugly, "This campus is overrun with gays and immigrants and trannies; it isn't safe." 

"Maybe you'll say that your Christianity is why you're doing this, Seabury," He goes on, glazing over the needless derogatary remark, jabbing at the cross around Seabury's neck, "But let he who has not sinned cast the first stone; love thy neighbour as thy love thyself. Remember that: you clearly have plenty of love for yourself, and quite a few sins of your own to lug around. So step down off this table and run home to daddy."

There is a solid heartbeat's respite. Anger colours Seabury's face. Hamilton should have seen it coming, but he was already drawing himself together for another argument. 

He does not count on brute force.

Seabury tries to swing at him, and the instincts of a childhood running wild on the streets of Nevis flare white-hot. Hamilton jerks back. His foot slips into a better defense stance- and slips off the table. 

The carpeted floor roars up to meet his back and for a moment the world is lost in red. 

" _Mary Hamilton and Samuel Seabury."_ Washington's deep voice echoes in the room, drowning even the wind. Watchers scatter. Hamilton catches sight of Gilbert ushering Herc out of the doors, and Peggy weaving through the tide to reach where he is slowly picking himself up. With the deep, swelling pain down his spine comes the deeper pain of that name being hurled at him twice in such a short time, and the situation catches up with him. Winded, trying to drag air into flattened lungs, Hamilton leans on his knees and gasps his panic down at the floor. John is there a second after Peggy, and they both take his shoulders with caring hands. Lee and Conway, Hamilton notes with a dazed satisfaction, left with the main brunt of the students. 

"Take her to the nurse's office." Washington tells Peggy heavily. He cannot look at Hamilton, but his next sentence is addressed for him "I'll deal with you later, Hamilton. Get out of my sight." 

Washington's smouldering gaze follows them out of the cafeteria, and it hurts more than the carpet burn and the slow-blossoming bruises. 


	7. Chapter Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GCSEs are completely over and I'm finally back writing! I am incredibly happy to bring you guys a shiny new chapter with plenty of sunchild John Laurens

 

"What were you _thinking?"_ Washington demands, and Hamilton drops his phone in a shuddering of fear. He looks up from the screen as Washington storms in, dumping a thick sheaf of papers on the desk and pacing back to slam the door.

"Seabury was calling out a fellow- a fellow..." Hamilton swallows thickly,

_(Do I want to say this now?)_

straightening his shoulders, "A fellow transgender student. I couldn't let that happen, sir. I didn't intend to cause a scene-" 

"No, no-" Washington waves his hand dismissively, and Hamilton stops suddenly, frowning up at his teacher and mentor with his mouth slightly open. The goldfish-esque expression would have been embarrassing in any other situation, but this is behind the closed door of Washington's office. "You attacked Samuel Seabury? _Samuel. Seabury_. Hamilton- he can send George King and all his henchmen down on your head, and from the looks of things that is the last you need right now." 

"So, I'm not... in trouble?" 

"Oh, you're in trouble." Washington finally sweeps down into his chair, and Hamilton is shocked by the crumbling of the older man's iron will; by the buckling and the exhausted folding of those strong limbs into the cracked brown leather of the seat. Leaning his forehead into splayed fingers, with his eyes shadowed by a deeply furrowed brow, Washington sits in tense silence for a few minutes. Letting Hamilton sweat it out, he supposes. He tucks his feet under his chair with ankles crossed, and counts the greying strands in Washington's hair with detached surprise. Hamilton has never noticed them before.  "That mouth of yours is getting you into trouble, but not with me. I wanted my promising firebrand back and I've got he- him. I've got him. What I saw in there was what I saw on your first day, when you called Jefferson out and beat him back with your words: intelligence, power, intellect. You are vast, Hamilton, and I am loathe to make you small but- for your own safety, shrink. This is the best college you could attend in the greatest city in the world, so don't throw your chances into fights or you won't have any left; George King is a monster of a man, but he owns this college and without his money it would go under. If he says you have to go, we can do nothing to stop him from making you go." 

"I won't let him." Hamilton crosses his arms. 

"Hercules Mulligan once sat in that chair and said the exact same thing. Mr Franklin stood in that corner, and I sat where I sit now; and Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin is not a man who cries but I saw tears in his eyes that afternoon." 

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because Hercules was a promising student with a flair that made Franklin vouch for him in a way I have never seen him do so for anyone else. Hercules was adaptable and had an integrity for problem solving that made his textiles work bold and brave, and he was aiming for the Parisian scene. Now he runs his brother's rental shop. George King made that happen because Hercules refused to shrink." Washington finally lifts his head and leans forwards on crossed arms to stare at Hamilton. 

"So..." Hamilton licks his dry bottom lip and looks down, locking his fingers in his lap. His shoulders slump. "I can't- I can't do anything, while I'm here?"

"You can.- That is why I came looking for you today." Washington suddenly brightens up and pats Hamilton on the shoulder before drawing back. "I'm starting an anonymous online platform for debates-"

"Is that a good idea?"

"Yes." Washington's hand connects with the desk with a solid thwack, and Hamilton jumps. Pain sparks in his lower back and tailbone. "Hamilton, students can say what they want and nobody can get into trouble because nobody knows who they are; with people like you and Angelica and Laurens and Burr to defend against anyone who abuses the anonymity, and puts out negative arguments, the student body will be exposed to the bigger picture and hopefully more than a few will have their minds changed. Articles can be posted and essay-style arguments exchanged. It is not a form for... uh, flaming- or internet gossip. You and I will curate that carefully."

Hamilton is painfully aware that he is gaping again, and cannot find the willpower in his shockslack muscles to shut his mouth again. Catching flies, his mother would have said. Well let the flies come, Hamilton thinks vaguely, I'll be damned. 

"Me?"

"Yes. You." 

Hamilton claps a hand to his mouth and swallows back a decidedly ten-year-old-girlish squeak. 

"But you've been angry with me- the... the clubs, the extracurriculars. You said you'd take me off-"

"So you would have time for this. I needed you to rise to the occasion, and you have. You sorted yourself out. Happy early Christmas- son." 

Hamilton leans right across the desk between them and hugs Washington at that- at the realisation that he is not a disappointment; at the acceptance in that little pause and following endearment; at the comforting weight of responsibility being set to rest across his shoulders by Washington once again. His mentor laughs awkwardly and gingerly pats Hamilton on the back, easing him into his own chair again with a tiny, embarrassed smile on his face.

"Thank you." Hamilton grins, "Thank you- oh, god, I have to find John and Peggy and tell them I'm not in any trouble- and... oh, this is so good. Thank you, sir-" Hamilton scrambles to his feet, grinning like a maniac and sweeping straggling curls of hair out his brightly flushed face. Gratitude and happiness have always been quite the cocktail for Hamilton; one he does not get to enjoy often.

"Hamilton?" Washington says as Hamilton is opening the door.

"Yeah?" he turns back in a breathless whirl on one heel.

"Do let me know when you find a name for yourself. Hamilton feels awfully formal, now that we're colleagues." 

 

Hamilton leaves the Social Sciences building with a grin on his face and a spring in his step, letting his feet guide him towards the arts department without thinking. Halfway there, he catches sight of Jefferson stamping a path through the snow. A moment later, James Madison comes hurrying after him. Their hands touch briefly, and James grips at Jefferson's coat. All words are swallowed by the wind and the snow, but Hamilton gets a glimpse of his old friend's face shining with desperation. Then Jefferson pulls his hand free and breaks into an almost jog, leaving James to stand alone, wilting in the cold. 

Hamilton shakes his head and shirks it off, but as he hurries towards John that niggling little voice in his head starts up again in earnest. 

* * *

 

"And he mentioned my name?- stop, stop moving." 

Hamilton pouts and sticks his fork back into his pot noodle, staring at John with mock-stillness and a raised eyebrow. He is sitting on a table in the otherwise abandoned art room John so fondly calls his second home, posing as John sketches and scribbles away behind a haphazardly propped up sketchbook on the table opposite. John has tied his blond hair back in a little bun, but keeps having to puff strands out of his face as he works. Occasionally, his eyes flick up to look at Hamilton.

Drawing, Hamilton has found, pulls a comfortable rambling out of John. 

It is nice to listen to, and even nicer to participate in. 

"Yeah, your name- look, are you sure you don't need a French girl pose?- so, you know, you can draw me like one." He wriggles his eyebrows. John's other hand moves with an uncanny speed, disconnected from his attention to the drawing: on minute it rests on the desk, and the next it has tossed a spare rubber at Hamilton. The offending object- heartshaped and Disney princess themed- bounces off Hamilton's forehead and drops into his pot noodles. "Fuck you, Laurens."

"What?- You moved. I need your eyebrows in the right place, so don't wiggle them again- anyway, so... Washington seems to think that _I_ will be good at defending The People on his platform thingy?" 

"John, he's a really good judge of character. And talent. If he thinks you can, you can; and nobody has to know it was you."

"I don't know, Ham." John wrinkles his nose and shakes his head, tucking hair back behind one ear in a distracted fashion. For a short while, their eyes avoid one another's: Hamilton looks around the paintings on the walls, displayed in the swathes of winter sunshine pouring through floor-to-ceiling windows; John becomes very focused on a tiny little speck at one corner of the page, working the detail there with his pencil with an unnerving fixation. "I don't know... I'm honoured, don't get me wrong- but I'll need to think on it." John concedes at last with an apologetic shrug, and he falls at last into silence. There are volumes in his furtive gaze, and Hamilton understand them all. He thinks. After all, hadn't Herc mentioned that bastard father? The venom was so unbridled and uncharacteristic for the big man. It would not be without cause. 

The soft scratching of John's pencil fills the air. Hamilton sits and pokes through his pot noodle, trying to fish out the rubber with the plastic fork and wondering how it is that when he is with John he can think about nothing at all. His mind has a talent for running itself in circles, building miles and miles of rail for the engines of thought and anxiety to eat up easily; burning endless fuel always. It feels so often that he is whirring away and devouring miles of rail and puffing grimy coal and getting absolutely nowhere, but in John's company he feels himself slow down. Just enough to enjoy the scenery. 

At long last, John tosses down his pencil and jumps up with a crowing sound- so sudden, Hamilton feels his being leap a good few feet out of his skin. 

"What, what?" Hamilton demands, "Have you finished- here, come on Laurens, let me look-" 

But John dances just out of reach with the sketchbook held aloft, firmly closed with a yellow elastic band. Hamilton pouts up at the taller man, but John only snorts and pinches his cheek.

"Nuh-uh. You can see when I've done them all."

"All?" Hamilton raises his eyebrows, and John curves a devilish smirk in his direction. Crooking a finger at Hamilton, he turns on his heel and runs through the swinging door into the adjoining art room. This one is smaller by far than the large one they had been sitting in: it lacks the huge windows and sprawling floor plan, but Hamilton can feel at once that this is the heart of the department. There is a distinct, forgotten broom-cupboard type feel to the little shoebox room, with the single long bench in the middle and an easel positioned below a grubby skylight. It has the microwave and the coffee machine, the stacks of instant food and mini fridge, the kettle and the boxes of various teas with a teapot in a pink and orange knitted tea cosy balancing precariously atop a huge pile of standard issue black sketchbooks. All of that is kept on a very large, very crowded, and very paint-spattered wooden desk crammed into the back of the room. 

John makes a beeline for that desk and drops into a crouch before it. Reaching beneath the narrow strip between the bottom and the floor, he pulls out three canvasses. It takes a moment of turning pebbles in his mind, before Hamilton touches on the right word: a triptych.

Pulling off the large sheet protecting the three panels from scuffing and dust, John presents the work to Hamilton with pride shining in his face. For the second time that day, Hamilton feels his jaw drop, flies be damned. 

The first panel shows a girl staring defiantly into the frame. She has a black eye and a split lip, and the set of her jaw makes for a chilling contrast with the cold desolation behind her eyes. A shiver walks Hamilton's spine. He _knows_ those hazel eyes with their dark lashes; but he knows them with more laughlines, and full of life. In the second panel, is someone closer to the Hercules that Hamilton calls his friend: the laughlines are still absent, but the first traces of them are forming. He smiles quietly out of the frame, arms crossed over his Nickeleback shirt. Some unsure anxiety still clings to his lashes and the curve of his lips, hidden in the corner of his mouth.  Buzzing with appreciative excitement now, Hamilton skips his gaze to the final panel; at last, he sees the man he knows.  This Hercules is gazing out of a train window, grinning against his fist and holding a dog tag between his teeth, as if sniggering to himself at something someone just out of sight has said. The painting is done in warm colours, and finally Hamilton's focus zooms out to see the bigger picture. 

The triptych fades from cool harshness to summer tones.

From Helena to Hercules.

From, as John would have said, the vulnerable caterpillar to chrysalis to that great big Atlas Butterfly with beautiful wings that span the world. 

"You're doing one for me, too?" Hamilton asks around the lump he is dismayed to find in his throat. A sudden, wild feeling sweeps up inside him as he looks wide-eyed at John; his gaze touches over the other man's lips for a heartbeat too long and electricity sparks hot-cold sweat down his spine. Hamilton leans subtly back and touches the wall behind himself for support. 

"Yeah." John nods enthusiastically. "You're different to Herc. He was this scrappy little fighter, apparently- picked a fight with Reynolds- and empty. You were all... filled up, with anxiety and energy when I met you in the cafe. You're already changing, after coming out to just one person. It's a super cool thing to capture in art." John takes Hamilton's shoulders and turns him gently to see each piece in turn as he talks, "This is the Hercules that Gilbert first knew. The empty one.- the middle one is how he was when I met him, almost there but not quite- he was still here at this point, and unwelcome- and... the Gentle Giant we know and love, on his way home from his first treatment session." John lets go of his shoulders, and Hamilton feels the other man's fingerprints burning against his skin still. Another shiver travels up his body, but this one is notably more pleasant and brings a soaking warmth with it, like stepping into a hot shower at the end of cold winter's day. 

"It's so good... why do you keep it under there?" Hamilton pulls himself from the brink of his thoughts, painfully aware that he is too impulsive for his own good and that such thinking in this little room with John could never end well. 

John's ocean eyes are suddenly overshadowed by the memories of a storm; his brow furrows together and shadows fill his sunshine features. 

"Because if George King knew it was here..." John spits on the carpet and then scuffs in guiltily with his boot, "And Herc doesn't want it up in the apartment. So.- oh, shoot!" John suddenly breaks off and hits the heel of his palm against his forehead. "-thinking of the apartment, it's my turn to do groceries duty. Gilbert will slaughter me and turn me into a fuckin' pie- I gotta run-" John hastily pushes the triptych away again and then turns to give Hamilton a fleeting hug all in one movement. "Thanks, for coming over here today. I gotta get the groceries before it gets too dark out and Gilbert panics."

They walk hastily back out into the ending afternoon, and John gives one last wave before dashing off into the glow of the setting sun, leaving Hamilton to trek back across campus alone, immersed in a steamcloud of thoughts puffing around his head for attention. It was only sheer gratitude, he tells himself firmly as he remembers that heartbeat where he almost leaned forwards and sealed the distance between himself and John. Nobody has shown him this much kindness in a while

_(I'm just not used to it. That's all)_

and so of course, his reaction would be strong.

Gratitude, yes... and more. John has a compelling quality to his personality, and Hamilton cannot deny that he is drawn in by it like a planet in the orbit of a flaming star. 

Hamilton knows that falling has always been a downfall of his. He tends to tumble down hard and fast, guzzling coal like gasoline all the way until his knees and palms are split on the solid ground. It is how it has always been for him. And no partner, potential or otherwise, has ever stuck around to wait for him to hit the tarmac. Only this time, he is coasting along by John's side and enjoying the scenery. A soft smile curls across his lips. 

"...ry- no, sorry- Hamilton- Hammie!" 

A voice slowly starts to shine through the thoughtsteam, and Hamilton blinks blearily. James Madison is hovering by his side, just a little behind his elbow like a nervous sparrow, wearing fluffy slipper-socks in the mostly cleared slush and biting his bottom lip. 

"Sorry, I didn't know what to call you..." James motions helplessly with his hands and shrugs, while Hamilton just looks at him slightly blankly. Finally, something clicks. 

"Oh, no, Hamilton is fine- what... do you need?" 

James and he have hardly spoken these past few months. Not since Jefferson began to gravitate towards the quietspoken Virginian, and Hamilton began to drift away to give the two of them some space. And to avoid Jefferson's hornets- the hornets most of all. This is strange and a little frightening. 

"It's Thomas." James looks like he might cry, "And I don't have anyone else to ask." 


	8. Chapter Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is intentional misgendering in this chapter (thanks, Seabury, gosh); just a heads up.

"He says he fell in the snow- says a lamp-post caught him-" 

Hamilton grips James by the shoulders and turns the other man to face him, staring into those whiteflashing, terrified eyes solidly. He finds himself trying to channel a bit of Washington's deeply-set calmness in a crisis; trying to be someone better than The-Yet-Unnamed-Hamilton with anxiety churning his pot noodle lunch to a sickening mush in his stomach. 

"James, what are you talking about?" 

"Thomas-" James flings up his hands in exasperation, "He was slumped outside the door, and then I couldn't get him to stand up, and... he's heavy. Really heavy."

A whirl of thoughts are going around in Hamilton's head. James' fretful panic is contagious. He remembers hands reaching; hands desperately grabbing; Jefferson walking on ahead. He remembers white teeth in a Cheshire-cat smile and the fractured light in eyes he would otherwise have every cause to hate. 

They stumble into the room with James shutting and locking the door behind them, and Hamilton's footsteps slow to a faltering little quickstep. Then he stops completely, and just gawps. 

"Damnit."

There, sprawled on the floor, is the man that almost every girl in the bathrooms-  a good number of boys, too- chatters about. About his pretty face; his charming smile... 

But someone has beaten one side of that face into a florist's shops worth of flowering bruises.  Bloody roses are blooming on one cheek, fed by drips of drying blood from a gash on his temple. His bottom lip is already swelling into an impressive violet hue that makes Hamilton feel more than a little sick. 

"Shit, James- he needs to go see the nurse. He needs medical help." Hamilton wants to shout but what comes out is a hoarse whisper. 

"No." Jefferson spits with his eyes rolled shut, causing Hamilton to jump. Jefferson's face is drawn tight with pain. James just shrugs faintly. Hamilton casts his gaze between them one last time, curses his soft little heart, and then takes Jefferson's other arm to help James get the taller man onto the bed.  

Jefferson groans and winces as Hamilton's hand knocks against his side, and Hamilton glances up at James with steely disbelief. The other man gives the faintest shake of his head.

_Don't._

_(Don't? Hell, Ham, this is a mess)_

Before James can tell him not to, Hamilton has yanked up the material to reveal more bruising along Jefferson's side. Hamilton's eyes widen and he stares up at James again, hands dropping to his sides limply. 

"James, what's going on?" 

"Nothing." James snaps suddenly, able to take Jefferson himself now and lower him onto the bed. Hamilton can only twist his fingers in his jacket and feel the confusion mount.

He steps back and watches as James tucks Jefferson in and fetches a bottle of water from their fridge, pressing it against the wounds marring Jefferson's face tenderly. Painkillers are dug out and downed quickly, and Hamilton remains hovering by the door until at last Jefferson sinks from his hazy near-conscious state into sleep. His breathing is still laboured with pain. 

"A lamp-post didn't do that."

"No." James swallows and sinks down on the edge of the bed. "I can't tell you who- I, I don't really know, but..." his lip twists and silence resumes.

"Why did you bring me here then?" 

James' pale eyes gaze swimmingly across the expanse of the room, silently imploring. 

"We were friends, weren't we?"

And yes, they had been friends. When Hamilton first washed up in New York, it was James Madison who took him under his little wing, such as it was. The Virginian had not been able to offer much, but he made a point of introducing the then-Mary to Elizabeth Schuyler- _("She's lovely, and she knows people. If you want to secure a place here, you need the right friends. And-" a pause, a glance at the notebook Hamilton clutched desperately, "-her little sister writes.")-_ and he took Hamilton to see a travelling circus along with Aaron Burr and Peggy. Hamilton had never been to anything as wild, as fantastic, as a circus. It was a chunk of his childhood he hadn't known was missing, and James gave it back to him. There had been a monkey there roaming the stalls and tents, and the two of them had sat and played with it in the shade of a tree. James- Jemmy or Jem to all those who meant anything to him- Madison had been such a good friend, until Jefferson came along and Jefferson had hornets. Hamilton does not know when he let himself fall away from James like a burning comet wrenched from the orbit of a stable star, but it happened and now he is being pulled back.

He sucks in a deep breath. It tastes like ashes in his mouth. 

No matter how many nights he tossed and turned and wished for Jefferson to meet a horrible end, he had never really wanted it. And never like this. 

"You need a drink, and something sweet." Hamilton says at length, and offers a weak smile as an olive branch. James only hesitates a moment, and then grasps it with both hands. 

"King's?" James asks with a slight tilt of his head, pausing a moment to fuss over Thomas

_(Thomas now, is it?)_

a little more. 

"King's." Hamilton confirms with a smile. 

There will always be another day to dig to the bottom of the fine mess that Thomas Jefferson seems to be in. For the rest of this one, Hamilton wants to re-capture a friendship that had once been so very close to his heart.   


* * *

By the time Hamilton leaves King's, alone, he is weighed down with a bag of muffins that he was powerless to refuse, and has manages to re-gather the spring that John put in his step earlier in the day. The moon looks red as it lifts above the unsleeping, baleful glare of New York's lights, and a dark shadow hulks in front of it. There were still some in the Caribbean who would spit on a moon such as that, and name it an ill omen. Hamilton thinks that it is beautiful, in a hauntingly desolate sort of way. As the moon rises into the cool of the night, the red bleeds out of it onto the snow, and a pale silver eye opens at last to rival the distant neon sparkles below. 

James had left the cafe early to go back and see Jefferson, and Hamilton had remained behind to help Marie and Louis clear up from the day. It was busier than usual, Louis told Hamilton with pride, arms flung wide to display the impact of the children who had, as Marie said, torn the cafe apart like grubby little whirlwinds. Now there is a pleasant ache in Hamilton's shoulders from lifting chairs, marred only by the vague discomfort of the tight, cropped vest that has been standing in for a proper binder. He feels alive in a way he has not felt for a long time. 

Despite the makeshift binder, a weight has been lifted from his chest. 

In his moonlight reverie, his feet lead him blindly down the alleyways he has always favoured instead of the main road. At this time of night, it is perhaps not his smartest move, but his thoughts are miles and miles and an ocean away, in the little shop his mother used to own. He had often helped there as well in much the same way, hungry for a pat on the head and a compliment. Sometimes he would dress in his brother James' clothes and people would call him a good, darling little boy. Now Louis calls him a good man, and the dizzy pretence of his childhood has become a reality. 

Up ahead, a shadow flickers between brick walls and Hamilton tenses slightly. His muscles coil in, readying himself for a sprint. His ears are straining against the muffled blackness for any sound that might give something away. 

A pair of eyes look up at him like lanterns, and a sleek shape flows waterlike across his shoes. The cat mews up at him for attention, and Hamilton laughs, kneeling to stroke it. He can feel bone beneath his matted fur, and when he draws them back in the dim light the darkness of blood is spilt across his pale fingertips. The cat's head nods against his leg in fainting affection. Frowning, Hamilton lifts the animal gently in his arms and pulls a corner of his jacket around its form: all lean sinew and jagged bone, it snuggles for the warmth of Hamilton's beating heart like a blind kitten. 

"Let's get you inside. It isn't all that far home now, just another fifteen minutes." He murmurs with a silly little smile on his lips. 

"I hope you're not going to take him back to your room, Mary. You know that animals aren't allowed in the college accommodation." 

Samuel Seabury. 

Hamilton jumps, clutching the scrawny cat close as he turns around and comes nose-to-chest with the solid figure of James Reynolds. A quiet curse slips out of Hamilton's mouth. Glancing back over his shoulder, he realises that Seabury is standing a mere fee metres behind him. 

"It isn't any of your business, Seabury." 

"It's George King's business, and that makes it mine." Seabury smiles. "How is your back, by the way? It doesn't hurt too much, does it? I am terribly sorry." 

"Fine, thanks. Can I go? It's getting late." 

"Do you think she can go, Chuck?" 

Hamilton then notices Charles Lee leaning against the far exit of the alleyway on his phone, playing a game with one earphone in; the other dangles loosely in show of blasé uncaring. Obnoxious, even. 

"Nah." Lee shakes his head. 

"What are you after?" Hamilton demands. 

"Just to let you know, Mary, as a friend-"

"We're not-"

"-or a peer, if you so prefer," Seabury smiles graciously, but it falls a long way short of his cold, hard eyes, "what happened to Mr Jefferson is only a small sample of what might happen if you stir up any more trouble." 

Hamilton feels his stomach rise and his heart drop to replace it. _Fuck._ His senses sharpen into high definition. This is a fight has cannot win, and sometimes a tactful retreat is a good idea.

He spits in Seabury's face and makes a beeline for it.

Hamilton always was a street-smart, scrappy child with a talent for sprinting. Granted, he was often racing towards the trouble, but there were times where he had had to run- and run hell-for-lather; run for his life. It was not something to be proud or ashamed of then, and it isn't now. It is only survival, so that he can fight another day. 

Red pain slices into his throat as Reynolds grips the back of his collar and his shirt momentarily cuts off his breathing. The cat is flung from his arms in the sudden halt and Seabury's white trainer flashes out in the moonlight. Terrified, it skitters out of the alleyway yowling blue bloody murder at the uncaring moon. Hamilton's heart flutters like a bird in his chest, and in his head the twin engines are roaring desperately away in circles, going nowhere. 

"You won't get away with this-" 

"Oh, please." Lee snorts suddenly and Reynolds turns Hamilton to face the third man. "King basically lets us do what we want. It isn't like he can do anything else, the way he is now. If the old man can't check for himself, he's only going to know what Sam tells him. We don't have to tell him any of this." 

That sparks something in Hamilton's brain, some fresh fuel. King has not been seen for a long time; he pumps money into his college and lets his student-teacher board sort things out. The only problem is, letters kept coming in with calls for the removals of the best people among them; Hamilton and Angelica included. Jefferson is still there, and Washington is hanging onto his position by his fingertips. George King himself, however, has not turned up at a meeting since before Hamilton arrived in America. Seabury has been speaking for him. 

But what if Seabury has been using George King's power to speak for himself?

_(Looks like all my lucky stars fell down)_

"I'll get you back for this." Hamilton tries as Reynolds' knuckles dig into the back of his neck, yanking a fistfull of jacket, shirt and cropped vest all together. It is getting harder and harder to breathe now. Black spots dance in front of his eyes. Seabury's cocksure smile only emphasises the futility of his threat. 

And then everyone freezes. 

Loud singing is drifting along from the path beyond the alley mouth. 

" _Well the morning came_ _like a freight train_

_Bearing down on me from a thousand miiles of rail_

_Well it came and gone and kept nah-d-da..._

_Layin' up all night with my mh-mhh-da as my veil_ _._.." 

It is off-key and words are missing, but Hamilton knows who it is. He had promised to listen to that song himself, walking home from the cafe after meeting John and Gilbert. Hamilton is abrubtly dropped by Reynolds, who shoves him to his knees, as the three assailants scatter for the alley exit. Charles Lee sprints off first, leaving Seabury to struggle behind them. Hamilton is breathing hard, trying to pull air into lungs that feel dry and deflated as old seed husks in the frosty air. 

"John?" He wheezes, coughing and massaging the base of his throat. John is there in an instant, the cat on his shoulder and concern in his eyes. 

"I heard it all. This lil' guy scared the living daylights out of me, well, nightlights- so I pulled off my 'phones and all I could hear was Lee's obnoxious yapping."  John scratches behind the cat's ears, "I figured if I came along making a load of noise, they'd clear off."

"I'm really glad you figured right." Hamilton rolls his eyes, breathing in deeply and sinking back into the wall behind him. His eyes drift closed for a moment. Then open again in puzzlement "What're you doing out here?" 

John silently holds up the shopping bag in his hand. 

"I was in such a rush earlier, I forgot fish. Good thing I came back and caught you as well." 

"I possibly owe you my life." 

"Nah, you just owe me some company on the walk home- come on, it's late. You should stay for the night instead of going back to college, anyway. It might be safer." John starts to jog backwards, his newfound feline friend clinging indignantly to his shoulder. "Anyway, you owe your life to a salmon, actually. The least you could do is eat the poor guy." John then points out. Hamilton cracks a grin. 

"Alright." He lights swats John's other shoulder and turns him around, and they start back together for the apartment. If their hands sometimes brush and shoulders touch more than neccessary, well, Hamilton blames it on the shock of the evening. It has been quite a day, after all. 


	9. Chapter Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two things: the image of Morgan Freeman as Franklin refuses to leave my head, despite this being RPF, and I'm working on something attatched to this fanfic. (I want to keep the preamble short, so please read the notes at the end for more information)

The next few days expand outwards without a hitch, and Hamilton is able to catch his breath for the first time in a long time. Seabury keeps his distance, and things return to the comfortable pattern; but so much is vastly different than it was before. There are the evenings spent studying with Gilbert, who has completed their own version of Law already in France- the only thing holding them back here, they say, is their uneven command of English- and there are the lunchtimes spent in the art department. These are the times that Hamilton would once have spent alone.  


His life has settled into a gentle spool, giving Hamilton plenty of time to fling himself back into his work. There is a lot of lost time to make up for; so many essays that need to be re-done. Not to mention, the Thanksgiving break is approaching, and for the first time, Hamilton feels that he has something to be thankful for; something bigger and broader than his own simple survival. 

"Lock up when you're done, John." 

Hamilton jumps, glancing up from his laptop. Franklin has stood from his desk and tossed the keys to John, who catches them one-handed. The mindless dexterity makes Hamilton smile, even as it needles his heart. Does John realise how breathtaking he can be, even without trying?

Franklin is another change; another thing to be thankful for. He is tall, dark-skinned and sun-freckled, with tufts of white hair usually kept tucked beneath a flat cap. If Washington is oak and brimstone, then Franklin is granite and mountain. His feet are planted firmly in the ground, but his head reaches for the clouds: he is a man with dreams and hopes, and the means to carry them out. 

They had gone to Franklin the next day, he and John, spilling their nighttime encounter onto the teacher who sat in silence until they were done, bushy brows furrowed and eyes sparkling beneath the rim of his cap. 

"Well, you must spend more time here, then. Seabury would not dare come into my office." Was all Franklin said once they were done, but Hamilton had spent years learning to read people. He did not need psychology to tell him that the gears were already turning in the older man's head. 

John has complete faith in Franklin, which is enough for Hamilton. And Franklin has complete faith in John, which means that he allows them to stay in the small studio after hours- he, John and Peggy. It is really quite touching. 

"I'm nearly done." Peggy throws up her hands dramatically, stretching with a huge yawn. Her booted feet are propped sideways on a second stool, and most of her weight is thrown onto one elbow. She has taken up all of one side of the table, while John stands beneath the light working at his canvas. "Where're you at, turtle?" She calls to John, tacking on the nickname that Hamilton doesn't think he will ever understand.  


"Tired." John murmurs, staring at his painting with lidded eyes. Hamilton snorts. 

"That makes three of us. Come on, it's almost half seven- can't we call it a night?" He asks, and John whirls around with a wide gasp. 

"The great Hamilton wants to _call it a night_?" John claps his hands over his mouth and mocks a faint, in the same way that Gilbert does his ridiculous French mime impressions. "You're growing old, Ham."

"Oh, all this stress is  ageing  me overnight." Hamilton rests his temples between his fingers, staring at the essay in front of him. Isn't that the truth? He has repeated the same sentence twice in a row and the whole thing is littered with words underlined red. Exhaustion is making him go all blurry at the edges. 

He barely slept a wink last night, tossing and turning and wondering where the hell to start. It has been a question that has plagued him a lot lately. Neither Washington nor Franklin have made a move, and Hamilton can feel the situation stagnating. He supposes that anyone else would be grateful: Reynolds has not showed up on Campus, Seabury has kept quiet and things have simmered down into a semblance of calm. Theodosia is still in the boy's dorms though, and word is that she is looking for a place off campus. It rubs him the wrong way in every direction, thinking that she feels pressured to leave. 

Hamilton has no idea what he had expected, telling Franklin about his suspicions- a cavalry, perhaps? Franklin and Washington storming campus like Enjorlas and Marius at the barricade? Stupid. The students had all died in Les Miserables anyway, and absolutely nothing had changed. Revolution got them nowhere. Hamilton really wants to get _somewhere._

Thanksgiving break is in a fortnight, and he is so painfully aware of time being eaten up that his sleep is being devoured as well. 

"We're doing what we can. Ange wrote to pops." Peggy reminds him. 

"A letter takes aaages." Hamilton groans in  exasperation, "You should have let me email him."

"Oh please." John shakes his head, "Philip Schuyler does _not_ email. You know what, I once emailed him-"

"Nobody cares." Peggy says bluntly, doing what Hamilton is thoroughly incapable of and  interrupting  John. Scrolling listlessly back through his essay, Hamilton wonders whether Peggy really understands the gravity of the situation. 

You know she does, a voice in the back of his head reminds him; Peggy understands better than you think. She is almost as snappy and street-smart as him, in her own way. While her sisters were playing tennis and  horse-riding,  while Angelica practised her journalism and Eliza her running stitch, Peggy would go out into the city and run amock with the children her own age. Gang politics, she sometimes called it in light jest, but it has shaped her seriously nonetheless. She spent most of her formative years in a power play. Of course she understands. 

Still, Hamilton wishes that she could drop the wit and sarcasm for a moment and show him just how seriously she is taking it. He has to  forcibly  swallow that comment down. I'm exhausted, he reminds himself. I don't want to say anything I'll regret. 

"Okay, yes. Doing what we can. Of course." Hamilton concedes bitterly. They can't do anything until the important pieces 

_ (We're pawns glued to the board)  _

decide where to go.  


Hamilton closes his eyes briefly and listens to the faint pulse of music from John's headphones, the scratching of Peggy's pencil as she analyses her studies; but the restless strumming of his own heart is still the loudest sound in the room. Idly, he clicks off of Notepad and onto the debate platform. He scrolls through myriad, relatively inconsequential feeds, until something stops him short.  


What he finds cuts him deep, bursting into his consciousness and shattering all attempts at being content. 

"Guys." He says, very softly. They don't answer. " _Guys!"_ he snaps out and Peggy looks up abruptly. "It's Seabury, it has to be-"

"What are you on about?" Peggy takes the laptop and turns it around. Hamilton watches her face fill with horror and then collapse into a still, glassy anger. She looks unnervingly like Angelica then.  


John rushes over, picking up on the situation at once, and the three of them open up the feed. Hamilton's finger joints feel full of sawdust as he tries to guide the mouse. 

_** Should Transgender Students be Allowed  Accommodation ?  ** _

_Recently, Terrance Bartow has made the choice to become a girl and move into the girl's rooms. This is no doubt a huge concern, and as students of this most noble and ancient college, we must ask ourselves if this is behaviour we can condone. Terrance is not alone in his newfound attempts at expression. Variety is the spice of life, or so we are told, but Mary Hamilton also seems to think that she can fool us all into believing she is every bit as male-_

That is all he can manage. He stands, knocking his stool to the floor with a clatter as loud as thunder. Had he thought he could get away with this quiet breathing space? No. And as it turns out, Hamilton has spent more than enough time breathing, thank you very much. Every nerve is crying out for action, for movement. 

"I'll kill him. He thinks I can't get at him?- oh, my God, he doesn't know _shit._ I can fight. You don't grow up on Nevis and not know how to throw a decent punch, and I really want to throw a few of those right now or so help me-"

"Stop!" John is there, grabbing one of Hamilton's hands as the immigrant tries to reach for his bag. A thrill of heat runs up Hamilton's arm, wrenching him out of the hypothetical world in which he leaves Seabury lying in the snow in the same way he had left Jefferson. His breathing had picked up to an unsteady pace, but it levels out as John moves to grip his shoulders. That heat trickles down Hamilton's entire body, and Hamilton wonders vaguely if John knows what he is doing; knows the powerful effect of every touch on the younger man. It has only increased since that night they walked back to John, Gil and Herc's apartment. 

"John..." 

"I want to knock a few pegs out of Seabury. I really do- I think I'd even help you, and I don't actually know shit about fighting- but _you can't_." 

"I can't?" Hamilton has learned that there are a lot of things you cannot do in life: y ou can't stand up in front of a hurricane, you can't fight someone else's depression, you can't write away starvation, sickness or crop failure- but this, this can be done.

"You can't change the world, Ham. And I don't want Reynolds getting at you, please, don't try." John shakes him slightly, begging with his open face and his wide eyes and his trembling bottom lip, _oh god_ that _face_. That face, this person, telling him he can't do something. No. No, John doesn't get to do that. 

"I can change this place." Hamilton says defiantly. It sounds a touch too childish, even to his own ears. Swallowing down the ice in his throat, he continues, "Seabury can't do this- and what do you care anyway? You've known me, what, less than two weeks? We barely know eachother, we're just soldiers fighting the same stupid fight- John, let me past!" 

"Reynolds- you don't know... you don't even- do you _know_ what he did to Maria? And word is, he doesn't stop at women. No. Worse- he believes you're a woman, and he won't hesitate to remind you what he thinks!" John grips ever harder, and his hold is starting to hurt. 

"Let go!" He doesn't want to lash out at John, but when the mad blood rises and the delirium that earned him the nickname "little soldier" kicks in, Hamilton is not always in control of his impulses. He clenches his trembling fists.

"No. You're going to get _hurt_." Anxiety is swelling to fill John's expression. 

"Why do you care?" Hamilton repeats, not asking about this now. Asking something bigger- something about their friendship; whether it could be, just maybe, that Hamilton isn't alone in falling hard and fast. John lets go and  abruptly  steps back, gazing at him, pulsing with the tension of their argument. His gaze is coloured with desperation and something else, something that Hamilton cannot read but wants to _hope..._  


_(Stop. Stopitstop he's gay he wouldn'twouldn'twantyou wouldn't don'tbe stupid)_

"John-"

"Break it up, boys! Turtle, back down." Peggy pushes John back as she steps between them, and then lightly taps Hamilton's cheek with the flat of her palm. Not a slap, but a warning of one. She won't hesitate if this goes any further. "And Ham, if you dare leave here and go after Seabury, I'll spit in your saturday coffee for a month."  


Silence stretches across the room like a tarpaulin, with they three each a quivering, straining peg in a storm. Slow horror sinks into the soft lining of Hamilton's stomach, bumping its way down like a lead  balloon . He looks towards his feet, tearing his gaze away from John's eyes. Peggy tilts her broad boater hat back and sweeps a hand through her hair, exhaling shakily. 

"You can't even choose a name; can't get your own head screwed on straight- no way you're gonna rock our world, kid." She says dryly. "This is how things have been since the first George King founded this college." 

Ouch. Peggy has hit him with the absolute truth. 

That riles him up all over again, and this time he turns on Peggy. 

"I can't even pick a name? What does that have to do with anything? You know what, my mother once said-" and then it is gone. All the fight and anger and words he had been ready to fire at Peggy are lost on the tail-end of a  wisp  of memory, as elusive as fog after sunrise. Shrinking back down inside himself, he picks up his bag and shakes the red cloud from his head. 

"Your mother what?" John asks quietly, his fingertips brushing Hamilton's coatsleeve.  


"Nothing. You're right. I'm tired, I...." deep inhale, exhale, "I'm going to bed." He says firmly, and leaves quickly, careful to avoid the raw look that John is giving him. 

His mother once... what? It had been there, and now it is gone. 

* * *

Hamilton's dreams take him along the intrinsically difficult, winding miles of rail in his head; powering down towards his childhood memories in his sloom. He sees himself before a mirror:

a little twelve year old girl with hands clasped miserably over the soft swell of her breasts and the last of the fever-sweat still shining on her brow, trying to understand. He felt so male, so much like a boy, and yet all who met him told him what a pretty little girl he was flowering into. 

_Blooming early, this one. Such a shame her mother isn't here to see it._

People, hammering on the door-

_Mary and James Hamilton, let us in._

And 

His mother, hair untied and flying loose in the sea air. 

And-

_Alexander..._

There's nobody else here. 

_Alexander?- Alexander!_

What- who's that?

_You, my son._

If that is you, mocking voice, leave me alone. I just want to sleep.

_Open your eyes._

I can't. I'm dreaming.

_I would have named you that, if God had been kinder. I would have. But God and the stars abandoned us when my old husband did, and you were made a girl in this Godless place._

You're sick, ma. Go back to sleep. 

_I think it's almost morning. There's a light outside the window, Mary..._

It's still dark outside. 

_Dawnlight- beautiful, isn't it?_

Go to sleep, ma, I love you-

_I love you, too... Alexander._

Hamilton wakes before the dawn. He has become  accustomed  to sleeping with his phone under his pillow, ready to buzz him awake long before the rest of the campus stirs. All the better to get in and out of the bathrooms. 

Pulling it out now, Hamilton sees that is is barely four in the morning. Only an hour until his alarm. What is the point in trying to sleep any longer? He has somewhere to be.  


He slips from the bed, gathering his washbag and scowling at the pink plastic. It isn't that he cares about the colour, per se- quite a few men can pull off pink and purple, Jefferson included; and good on them- but he has started to care more and more about the face he shows the world. Gilbert says he should not, that he ought to stick up his middle fingers and strut about with his pink bags and sparkly plastic hairbrush and mostly girl's shirts. Not everyone has that confidence though, and Hamilton is reduced to sneaking around at awful hours in order to sort his bathroom business and just spend time _thinking._

God, does he need to do that. His own head-space has always been a valuable, and when he doesn't get it...

Well, last night with John and Peggy is evidence enough of what happens then. 

Before long, he has tied the few longer straggles of his hair back in a low ponytail and slipped out of the college grounds into the new day. He follows his favourite path, along the winding streets and to the wider walkways and the river. Halfway there, he breaks into a run. 

Breezing along gravelled pavements and across cleared roads, dodging the first cars and trucks and cabs of the morning; his trainers pound in keeping with the beat of his heart. It feels so good to get out of there, to flee from everything and run towards nothing in particular. As his blood gets going, so does his brain. 

Some people run to impress.

Hamilton runs to survive, to just, well, _run._

When the world grinds to a halt and peters off; when all  rhyme or reason is lost and the path seems to meet a dead end; when his blood cools and starts to clog his whirring engines- Hamilton sprints it all out. Past a delivery cyclist, feet skidding before a light and then taking off again once the walking man goes green, and then tearing away from the crush of the inner city. When he arrives at the riverside walkway he throws up his arms and comes to a halt, breathing hard. 

"Well run, sir." a passing old lady comments, hobbling along with her walking stick. Hamilton pauses a moment, 

_ (?but I'm not binding?) _

 staring after her in shock. Then a silly, lop-sided grin dares to curl up one corner of his mouth. 

"Thank you! Have a good day!" He calls after her, warmed against the day by the little wave she turns to give him. And it had been a _him_ she saw as well. 

Hamilton claps a hand to his mouth, a deeply-set weight dislodging itself from his chest ever so slightly. The cobwebs have been swept clean away now, and he feels free to enjoy the swirls of pigeons rising from the highrise buildings, their nightroost disturbed by the skirl and bustle of now-distant New York traffic. 

Certain thoughtpoints stand out to him, no longer made fuzzy by sleep, as he begins his favourite morning walk for the graveyard. He reflects on the fight with John and Peggy. John had looked so _hurt,_ and so... well, desperate. Desperate to keep Hamilton from trouble. 

The rational part of his mind argues that Reynolds must simply be as awful as the rumours say- John would know through Herc- and John, being the good person that he is, does not want anyone to go through that. Rationality has no ground though, not in the face of Hamilton's little, irrational Cupid-struck thoughts. He wants it be more and oh damn him, that is how he keeps interpreting it.  

And then at the end of that fight, when Peggy intervened...

Hamilton pauses, unlatching the buckling gate to the  graveyard  and slipping inside. The pre-dawn grey is mellowing out at this point, rising above the rows of ancient graves. Gently, he closes the gate again. It has probably been here since the 1700s, maybe even before that, and Hamilton would love it to stand for a few centuries more. This is a halfworld of ghosts, especially at this time of day. The church it stands behind is almost forgotten, a semi-derelict brick sprawl with a small, crooked spire; it looks like the structure has grown exhausted over the years, and is now spilling back out into the river. Only the overgrown hedgerows and snarling brambles keep it hemmed in. 

A lone gardener, withered and weathered, is on his hands and knees weeding the small plot of flowers either side of the walkway to the doors. He is always here, old enough to be a part of the brickwork itself. Hamilton hardly counts him as another living soul. 

They have never bothered one another, at least.  


For the first time in two weeks, he manages to pull himself above thoughts of John and latches onto that little teasing of memory instead. It had stirred him up, woken his repressed childhood demons and urged the feverdreams to come rushing back. Hamilton has not been haunted by Rachel Hamilton's ghost in his dreams for years; and never with the palpable potency of last night. 

Sinking down onto a bench beside a gnarled old tree, he closes his eyes and inhales the scent of mildew and clean earth. One day soon the rest of New York will engulf this little bubble of  tranquillity , but for now it stands quaint and firm, and shelters Hamilton from the outside world. He basks in it for a long time, feeling warmth creep along his fingers with the daylight. 

His eyes crack open. The world has changed around him. 

The graveyard is kissed with yellow ochre and rose madder, and the snow is shining. Slow-melting rivulets of water run down the central oak, bleeding from boughs weighed down with snow for too many days. At last, the freeze is thawing out. Hamilton stands there for a moment and breathes it all in _._ He needs to remember to breathe, sometimes- or at least, that is what his mother used to tell him. 

The scarred-over wound of her death throbs suddenly. 

He dreamed about the island he used to call home, about the wild cliffs and seething seas and a figure- the figure of his mother, caught a moment in the sunlight as she waved good-morning to the gulls. She turned, and she smiled at him, _him_ , and her eyes were mellow with understanding. He saw the room where they had lain together in a steaming fever-sea, and his mother's onyx eyes bloodshot and rolling. But still kind, and compassionate, and everything that made her _her._ He had forgotten that last conversation, those last words that left her lips.

They had both gone to sleep after that, curled on the soaked sheets beneath the engraved mahogany cross that hung at the head of the bed, with brine-laden air bringing the distant scent of flowers inside from Rachel Hamilton's tiny little rose garden. Mary woke up. Her mother did not. 

"...and I forgot that." Hamilton, Mary-

_(what's my name now?)_

_-_ Alexander-

_(...She would have called me that, had God been kinder...)_

_Alexander_ whispers to himself as he trails his fingers over the damp tree bark. 

Deep, deep down inside a bubble of joy is rising, pulling itself from the unravelling knot of anxiety in the pit of his stomach up- up to the swelling pulse of his heart in his throat. There is a happiness here without name: a rich, full-bodied happiness that makes his head swirl and his veins sing with a drunken thrill. 

"Alexander Hamilton." He tastes it on his tongue. The tenor rings true. 

Hamilton breaks into laughter, and the sun finally spills across the morning hubbub of New York.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've been thinking up a little accompanying fic, the working title of which is "according to Madison."- kind of self-explanatory, maybe, I think, idk. It's the way that the events of this fic have unfolded from a James Madison/JeffMads point of view, but also the prequel story of them before. It could be a oneshot or it could be more- at this point, I haven't a clue- but whatever it turns out to be, would you guys be interested? (I just really love James, and I have a nice, big backstory for Thomas that actually has very little place in the main canon of this fanfic. Plus, JeffMads).


	10. Chapter Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> John and Alex need to stop

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I return once again with chapters written ahead in a bout of productivity, [a tumblr account](https://pistachiomercutio.tumblr.com/) to support this fic and others, and the sneaking headcanon that Peggy is poly.  
> Also, important notes on the future of this fic at the end

 

Hamilton

_(Alex now, Alexander)_

Has forgotten what it is to be alive. He hums and grins at his work and the Librarian tells him to be quiet. 

In an ideal world he would shout it from the rooftops, but the rooftops in this one are difficult; so he keeps his new name inside, like something to be hoarded, treasured. The sisters had been gone from the room by the time he waltzed over the threshold, but if they had been there he might have thrown it in Peggy's face with triumph. You can't even pick a name, Peggy had said as if it meant everything. And it did, but Alex had been too stubborn to see it. A name means confidence, and it means he has done what Washington asked, he has-

 Alexander's fingers sutter over the keys. He has confidence, yes, but what else? A grand mess, that's what: debate this evening with Seabury, to which Thomas most likely won't come, and the meeting above Herc's shop tomorrow, to which Thomas also won't come. James says that he has been emailing sick to all his professors. He won't leave his room. And it isn't Alex's problem, but it it also kind of is. Thomas had been attacked as a warning to him. 

Washington's instructions to Alex had been to get his shit together, more or less, and he has. But. He has somehow built an even bigger pile of it in the process. Alex brushes his fringe away from his face and shakes his head. Things have to change, and he'll be damned if he just sits off to one side, but what of everything else he has worked for? What of John Laurens, of the dreams that Alex is too ashamed to admit to, of the hopes he has allowed to build? 

He taps out the last few sentences of his essay and glances across the room, trying to get out of his own head. Theodosia is in a far corner, headphones on, a pile of textbooks by her side. She is engrossed. Alex looks away quickly. He logs out of the computer and sits back, pencil between his teeth, trying to sink through the black of the screen in front of him. The epiphany is starting to cool off. His own reflection blinks back at him. He thinks about Thomas again, and those bruises, and the dead hornets lying on the floor. A frown furrows his forehead. 

"Screw this." He says to himself. The Librarian raises a sharp eyebrow, but Alex ignores her. He gathers up his bags and books and walks outside on legs like stalks. He would like to think that everything had been simple before Washington said those words, that My Boy, the thing that changed everything; but that would be a lie. There had been the complaints whispered behind textbooks in class, notes passed like sparks of rebellion, ripples in the water. 

"Theo's really grateful, you know?" Maria's voice reaches him and he looks around. She is sitting under the tree, arms bare and immersed in a pool of weak sunlight, the faint cinnamon of her skin blanketed by gooseflesh, flask held between her hands. "For you standing up for her. She's just shy. She doesn't want you to feel like you have to talk to her just because you're both trans." 

"Well, we do kinda have to stick together." Alex says, unsure what to do. He backtracks and comes to hover in front of Maria, who pats the space on the bench next to her. They have never really had much of a conversation together, outside of the bathrooms. Not that Maria is bothered by that. 

"True, but be careful; don't get her into anything without being sure you'll be able to get out of it again." Maria's smile is small and ironic, and very hard to read. It is a smile written in a language that Alexander has no idea how to speak. She says nothing more for a while, just pulls off the lid of flask, the smell of hot chocolate spilling out. Without a word, she pours a little into the attatched cup and another glug into the lid, giving the cup to Alex who takes it gratefully. The chill is crawling under his clothes, but, he realises too late, Maria is keeping them out here so that Alex does not have to face the girls inside. 

"They got Thomas Jefferson, didn't they?" Maria waves his half-shaped protest away and pulls at the choker around her neck, as if it uncomfortable. Alex's eyes drop to it and he is not quite sure why; maybe it is the way that she looks at him, with eyes like a she-wolf. "I hear things down the grapevine." She shrugs and sips her hot chocolate. Alex watches her in profile: the drop of her lashes, the slight sadness in her smile. 

"John said something-" Alex hears himself say, "About Reynolds, and..." 

"About James abusing me, is that it?" Maria raises an eyebrow and her fingers hook into the choker again. She twists them in and then her hand drops like a stone, but Alex gets a glimpse of pinkish scar tissue underneath. Guilt stabs through Alex. "Seabury needed his thug, and so the charges just dissolved. Amazing, isn't it, that things like that can happen in this world?" 

"I'm-" 

"No. Don't tell me you're sorry." Maria cuts him off and pulls on her coat, placing a cold hand over Alex's and giving a little squeeze. "You don't have to apologise for what he did." She stands up, and that is when Hamilton sees it, in the series of badges worn down one shoulder like military stripes; in the little pheonix pin she wears over her heart: a survivor, an ally, a soldier. 

"Maria?" He calls as she starts to walk away. She turns to walk backwards, hands in pockets, eyebrow raised. Yes, she is asking him. "Do you know where the old DVD rental place is?" Alex has to stand and walk after her. 

"Yes." 

"Okay." Alex pushes air from his chest and starts to explain, and all the while she watches him her eyes take on a fierce kind of glow. Her ironic little smile turns predatory. 

* * *

For every person that enters the room, Hamilton's heart gives a little jump: Gilbert, Herc, Eliza, Angelica, Peggy,  Maria, Burr, Theodosia, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson. They scatter themselves around on the crates and chairs, and the radiator in the corner coughs out occasional puffs of heat, groaning to fill the stiff quiet. Angelica and Thomas eye one another warily; Eliza cracks open a couple of Thermos flasks of coffee; Maria checks her makeup in a handmirror; Theodosia tries to sink deeper inside her coat. Alex watches the door, the clock, the door again. He tries to squeeze every drop of time that he can, waiting for John, but soon Gilbert touches his knee and there is no way that he can put this off any longer. 

"I want to press charges against George King." He says. There is silence. And then there is a whisper, a murmur, a single heartbeat that sucks all of the air from the room. James gets halfway to his feet but sinks back down, and Thomas just stares from the yellow-green of his bruises with disbelief in his eyes. if not for Maria's half-smile, Alex may have buckled there and then, but instead he wipes the sweat from his palms and meets the eyes that are trying to make him quiet; make him small, for his own protection. "Perjury, first of all. Blackmail, violation of civil rights, I could go on but we all know what I have to say." 

"Alex, no. I know you want to fight, but you need to stay alive to do that- and this, just us-" she is choking on her own words and Thomas, of all people, steps in. 

"Were you even in the room last night? Seabury so wants to see your head on a plate. He probably has wet dreams about serving it to George King for dinner." Thomas smirks and lifts himself up a little. Shadows and light paint his skin with dark, ruddy hues, and the bruises throw his features into sharp relief. His teeth are very white when he bares them in pain and sinks back down into his seat, James' hand hovering by his shoulder. Alex and Maria look at one another. 

They'll be here, her look says, and Alex sure as hell hopes that she is right. He is praying on all of his lucky stars, grasping them tight in his fists; afraid. 

"Most of us in here are lawyers, or near enough. We know what we're doing." Alex points out.

"We're students." Thomas replies. 

"Grow a spine, Jefferson." Angelica bites back. Alex has an ally in her, at least, she who is studying to be an environmentalist or marine biologist. "I'm just as much a student as you, and I'm with Alex on this." 

"You're not even going to be a lawyer, Schuyler." Jefferson snarls. 

"I'm studying law, too." Angelica reminds him, speaking in silver: cold and metallic and very hard to argue with. 

"None of us should even be thinking about this." Burr shakes his head, "No way. We should sit back, and let it happen. Someone will step in if gets really bad." 

 "I get it. You're cisgender and heterosexual, and this doesn't really bother you, which is fine because you haven't had to deal with any of this. You don't have to be here, you know." Theodosia speaks up and bright colour bursts onto Burr's cheeks. He looks at her, ashamed, and she shrugs. "Nobody will step in but us." 

Alex has never heard Theo say so much before, but here she is, with Burr pinned to the proverbial bed of nails. Alex can see the cogs spinning under Burr's temples, but nothing is coming out. Gilbert clears their throat. They open their mouth to interrupt before things can go any further off into the unbeaten argument, but a cool hush falls over them instead. The radiator splutters and goes silent.

Three steps of footsteps on the stairs: one light, two heavy. Alex has to swallow down a smile. James and Thomas shuffle away from one another ever so slightly. 

The door swings open on a gust of cold air, and blows inside three figures bundled into coats, dark and bulky, save for the tan leather and white of one aviator jacket with a yellow hufflepuff beanie. John is grinning. The cold has left red stains across his cheeks and his lips are glistening.

"I've brought our cavalry." John says and flings his arms wide, a grand _viola_ that looks either ridiculous with the frozen rain on his collar and the high colour on his cheeks or truly adorable. Alex has no idea which. A smile creeps across his face, unbidden, and for a blessed moment he can pretend that John is smiling back. Then their eyes meet and skitter away from one another, like like charges under pressure: resisting, resisting always. The smile dies away. 

James stutters to his feet, elbowing Thomas off of their crate so that the two professors can sit down. Franklin accepts. Washington remains standing. His shadow spills across the room, and it is like sun to people starved for light: his eyes are smiling, even though his face is set into a mask. He frowns. It is Franklin who speaks, leaning with his legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles. 

"We weren't going to get involved. I told myself I was only a teacher but this-" he sweeps a hand over the state of the room, their bedraggled group, the lean hope in their eyes, "-tells me that I am here for something more than teaching art." 

"How can you help?" Peggy asks. Her voice is oddly small. 

"I know people, Margarita, and my people know what to do." Franklin has a voice like warm milk and it flows over them, soothing, rich. A coil in Alex's stomach loosens a little. 

"It won't be easy, and it will involve a lot of patience," Washington and Alex share a knowing look. Alex cannot keep the embarrassed smile off of his face, "But we're going to change things. Anyone who does not want to be a part of this can walk out."

Nobody does. 

"Let's overthrow the British Government!" John cheers with a fist in the air. The room dissolves into the laughter of the truly relieved. 

They break off into little groups after that, each one throwing their own ideas onto the pile as if this a student seminar, and not a serious matter. James scribes, and Alex catches the two Virginians moving ever so slightly closer together, shoulder to shoulder and, as the light melts into the warm colours of evening, their fingers fold together like birds coming to rest. Alex links his own fingers and looks over at John, who is deep in discussion with Franklin, sketching something on a page between them. Gilbert touches Alex's shoulder and draws his attention back, but all through the talking and planning, a fragment of Alex's mind remains strained towards Laurens. 

Steuben, Washington says, is how they are going to do this, and Louis Bourbon. 

Baron von Steuben, Alex learns, has been out of the game, so to speak, for a few years. He is ex-military, discharged from the army for the love of another man. Gay, Alex asks. Gilbert looks at him, before, Bisexual. Alex understands then the awe that Gilbert speaks of the Baron with. A portrait is being drawn for Alex of a broad man in an army coat, dark of eye and darker of mind, scarred by the fighting he saw and damaged by the other battle he fought: the battle for bisexual recognition in time when it hardly had a name. And thinking of names, they draw up a list.

Washington, Schuyler, Steuben, Franklin, Ross. 

Powerful names, all willing to come to their aid. They melt on Alex's tongue like sweets, and the aftertaste is glorious. Confidence starts to take root again, dredged up from the epiphany on Sunday morning overlooking New York. Alex catches himself smiling and, for the first time in a while, thinking only of his dreams. Not John. 

Although John is there again when they leave. Alex starts to walk out with Theodosia, the Schuyler three and Maria, watching how Maria is drifting into conversation with Eliza and wondering why everyone else seems to slot together with someone easily. Then Alex looks around and sees John hovering at the end of the path with his hands in his pockets, bundled up against the cold. His eyes are low and desperate. Alex steels himself, gathering cold armour close to his chest and holding onto the chill bite of it as he walks past, head down, trying to ignore the brush of fingertips against his coatsleeve. Damn John and his touches. His heart crawls into his throat and stays there, frozen. 

"Alex." And the shape of that name on his lips sends a spark of heat through Alex's stomach. He almost stops breathing. His footsteps slow. The others walk on, and Maria turns back just briefly to give Alex silky smile that tells him she knows. There is nothing but the shaking rise and fall of his shoulders between he and John now. 

"Yeah?" Any attempt at a cool attitude dissolves in the air when he realises how close to him John is. Almost at eye level, within touching distance, they stand face to face with all they want to say chained to the floor between them. Both of their mouths open at once, they falter, glance away. 

You go first; no, you. A childish sort of game. Alex pushes his hands into his pockets and wriggles his freezing toes, shifting from foot to foot. 

"You came out of the chrysalis. Agraulis vanillae." John smiles, and it meets his eyes. Alex's heart is singing and he is starting to step away, frightened by the pull in his gut, when John moves forwards. His hand closes around Alex's wrist and holds on tight, the other's eyes dropping down to the network of blue veins and the few freckles that are scattered, star-like, over the soft lines of tendons. Is John seeing him that way? Alex is staring at John and seeing oceans in his eyes, the tremble of his bottom lip, the white sunlight dancing over silver buttons and, _oh,_ the little trail of moistness left behind by his nervously darting tongue. Alex's entire body is swelling with his heartbeat and it hurts, it hurts. 

"John-" 

"We were tired. You were an arsehole, I was an arsehole. Can we just forget it?" John trundles across Alex's words, almost as if he knew what was going to be said. The question, the 

_(what am I to you?)_

is still simmering in the back of Hamilton's throat like so much hot venom. He feels feverish with it, dangerous, daring. His hand turns itself around and fingers brush over the inner curve of John's wrist, the little mole there, the ridge of bone. He finds John's pulse and presses into it with his fingertips, feeling the steady thud of it in time with his own. Neither of them separate. For now at least, they are joined.

"You're a good friend, John." Alex tests the waters with a tentative toe, finding it hard to breathe. John swallows. Alex watches the bob of his Adam's apple through the lapels of his coat. Now is the moment; now is the time when all tension and hope has crystallized, and John is afraid. Under Hamilton's fingers, his pulse is fluttering, weak-winged like one of his beloved butterflies.  

"A friend." John says, and pulls away, turns away, walking. Alex is left with his fingers still outstretched, drowning. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, we're ALMOST at the end of this part of the fic; the second part, To the Stars, is already plotted with a chunk of scenes drafted. This one was supposed to detail Lams and Alex's transition, and the transition has begun- all that's left is the Lams. Chapters nine (this one), ten part one and ten part two (final chapter) have been pre-written; they just need intensive editing. My mentally messed up self cannot promise a clean streak of updates, but I can promise that I won't abandon this fic- it's too important to me, and I value my Constant Readers too highly- and should have this first part done by the end of the month.


	11. Chapter Ten, Part One: Thanksgiving

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Thanksgiving, Philip Schuyler is a great cook, and Alex is confronting his sexuality head on. There are some things he really isn't thankful for.

Alex had almost forgotten that Thanksgiving was approaching until it loomed up, large, a slap in the face. The Tea Party, as dubbed by Peggy, was a week behind them, and a whole new can of worms had opened up in the meantime. Namely, coursework. When was the last time he had been able to focus on nothing but college work? Never, according to his memories. He actually finds himself enjoying it. 

He is walking sandwiched between John and Hercules, sharing earbuds with John and a coil of scarf with Hercules. Things are easier this way, with he and John; with Amos Lee or Hozier filling the silence. 

"Do you want to stay with us?" Gilbert tears their gaze away from his phone and looks at Alex, who takes out one of the earbuds just stares. 

"What?" Alex asks, feeling as if he is missing something obvious. Behind Gilbert's head, a poster advertising ready-cooked turkey flutters in the breeze. 

"Thanksgivin." Hercules taps a finger against Alex's temple and everything falls back into place. Alex slams the heel of his palm into the centre of his forehead. "Monday to Thursday, signs for it everywhere, thirty second ads for turkey recipes.- Ringin any bells yet?"

"Do you want to stay with us over the break?" Gilbert asks again, flashing their phone screen and a long list of contacts. They are planning a party. Alex twists around to look at the three Schuylers and Maria, who are trailing along further behind.

"What're the plans for Thanksgiving?" He asks them. Peggy looks to Eliza who is too deep in conversation with Maria to realise anything is going on, and smirks.

"Three and a half days with Dad." Angelica responds for her sisters. "You're coming. Dad wants to see you." 

Alex looks back at Gilbert and his apology is genuine for a few seconds, but then he catches sight of John and the words stick in his throat. He is glad that the Schuylers are going to be bundling him off. That way, there won't be John every morning; John wearing old sleep on his smile; John, a wall between them, close enough to touch; John... 

Oh Lord, when did it come to this? 

"Looks like I can't stay with you." Alex flashes a tight smile. Next to him, John winces. "I'll skype." Alex says in a rush. Hercules snorts. 

"It's not even a week, seriously? It's like you're boyfriends already." He ruffles Alex and John's hair and pushes the former in the direction of the path to campus with a smile that could be called fond. 

"What's the deal with you and Turtle?" Peggy asks him when they are almost alone, just the two of them on the path. Alex shrugs. He starts to walk away. 

"Nothing." 

"It's love, isn't it?" Peggy puts her hand on his shoulder. Alex looks back her. He says nothing, doesn't need to, because she has understood. She pulls him into a rough hug and they walk on in silence after that. 

 

Alex falls asleep in the car on the way to Philip Schuyler's retreat, and he dreams a fitful, sticky dream. This is not the first time, and he usually wakes up swimming in his bedclothes, quilt between his teeth. There are eyes in his dreams, and John, and footprints puncturing holes in the snow; sometimes he is looking down on a body that is not his, but should be, and there are fingers pushing down through auburn hair towards a non-existent heat. His cheeks flush and he tangles a hand in his hair, trying to keep his breathing even; trying to pretend that he is still asleep. But his eyes have already opened, and met with Angelica's in the rearview mirror. 

"You alright?" Angelica looks at him, and for a while he can only sit there, boiling inside his coat, heart in his mouth. Sweat trickles down his collar and he shudders. 

"Yeah. Why?" 

"You were pretty restless, is all." Peggy shrugs, and pats his head, pulling a face at the sweat lining her fingers. "Don't worry about it, not far now. I've got something for you when we get there." she passes him a bottle of water from under the seat and he gulps it back, feeling the water run down past the hollow pit in his gut.

"I look forward to it." Alex replies. He doesn't. Eliza is still asleep. Alex watches the city melt into the  faux-countryside and, finally, the tall hedges and gates of the Schuyler estate. Those gates are really just a formality. There are many ways onto the estate from the surrounding land, and footpaths through the fields, if you know how to find them as well as Alex does. It has been a long year since he was here last, small and malnourished with the dialect of another country still thick on his tongue like vegetable pulp. He had been her then, of course, and fragile. So fragile. Philip Schuyler had seen it as soon as he looked at her, and from that moment onwards the as-then Mary had become a part of the Schuyler family in all but name. 

Blood may be thicker but water is sweeter, Mr Schuyler had said with a look at the portrait of his late wife that hung over the fireplace. Mary gave him a tentative smile. He beamed right back, smiling out of a face built like an overhanging cliff. 

He is smiling when he opens the door to them, hugging his three children and then turning on Alexander. He may have put himself out here in this thin band of rural land, isolated despite the city being no more than an hour's drive in either direction, but Philip Schuyler is not an antisocial man. He envelopes Alex in old mothballs and coffee and licorice tea, ruffling the younger's hair with a grin. 

"You're going to make a fine young man." Philip says and Alex almost starts to cry there and then, until Peggy takes his hand and hauls him off to the room he will be occupying as his own for the next few nights. Philip insists on carrying their bags himself. 

"Guess what came through while you were asleep?" Peggy is fizzing with her news. She holds out her phone screen, and Alex blinks in a kind of disbelief as he reads the words, still groggy from his broken sleep. 

Washington has announced his Open-Mic event for after Thanksgiving, and the thread is already teaming with responses. Any comments from people like Seabury have been drowned out by enthusiasm from all sides. Everyone loves a good but of vitriol to sink their teeth into, but nobody more than students. Alex takes Peggy's phone and sinks down into the double bed he will be sleeping in. Hosted in King's, it says, and open to everyone. There are a list of charities that the proceeds will be going to, and a set of rules, which make a point of excluding all phobic, racist and cruel submissions. Triumph soars.

"A night to celebrate talent from opression." He reads and flicks through the page. 

"Also known as Come Talk Shit About George King's College, or whatever else bugs you." Peggy grins, "We're going to see who's for and who's against." 

"I think everyone's going to be for- us, that is." Alex stares at a barrage of enthusiasm from James McHenry. "You going to do anything?" 

"A poem." Peggy says, then pauses and glances at him with eyes full of thorns, "About love." 

She leaves it hanging open at that as Philip comes into the room to deliver Alex's bag. 

"I'm cooking us something small." he informs them. 

Something small turns out to be a huge spread of roasted turkey, vegetables, potatoes drowning in butter and crusty garlic rolls, still warm from the oven. Alex remembers when he thought that the Shcuylers were hiding an army of cooks somewhere in the house. It still amazes him that one man can make so much food, and that one small family group can put it all away. 

"I don't want any talk of this business at the College while you're here, understand? This is a time to give thanks and that, frankly, is not something to be thankful for." Philip tells them with the serving spoon in hand; everyone agrees, and honestly, Alex thinks he may have agreed to murder if Philip Schuyler had asked it just then. 

Mississippi mud pie follows the main meal, and a bowl of fruit. Alex says that he cannot eat another bite, and proceeds to finish two more servings, until he is bursting at the seams and has to excuse himself to remove his roughmade binder. He pauses in the bathroom mirror, staring at the red band left midway around his ribs and the marks from the straps, cut into the join of shoulder and neck. The skin is raw to touch and slick with sweat. Alex makes a mental note to get himself a proper one and discards the tight crop-top in his plastic bag for washing, pulling on an ugly knitted sweater given to him by Hercules over his angles and curves. 

There are fairylights strung up in the lounge when he returns, and the late Mrs Schuyler is wearing a neon crown, her face turned to a skull. Alex sidles in and takes a seat by Eliza, legs stretched over Peggy's, while Angelica reclines on the other side with a glass of Philip's home-brewed cherry wine in her hand. There is a basket of burnables between them: pinecones, orange peel, applewood. The room is soon full of warmth and spice and Alex leans into Eliza with his head on her shoulder, tossing pinecones onto the fire and watching them burst into amber sparks and ember glow. 

"Alex, hey, Alex." Peggy pokes his arm until he has to sit up and look at her, almost asleep, eyes fuzzy. 

"What?" 

"Are you thankful for John?" She asks. 

"Yes." Alex says, and he must be more tipsy than he thought, because his tongue is loose, "But also not, you know?" 

"I know." Peggy nods as if she has any idea at all. 

"What are you thankful for, Pegs?" Eliza asks and pokes her sister with one socked foot. Peggy makes a zip and lock motion and mimes throwing away the key for an added effect. 

"Not telling. What about you?" 

Eliza looks like she won't answer that. A flush has risen over her cheeks, the same colour as the wine in her glass. She works around the name in her mouth for a long time. Philip Schuyler snores. 

"Maria Lewis." Eliza finally breaks her silence and Peggy bursts out laughing. They had all known that answer anyway. Alex takes Eliza's glass and sips a little down, not overly fond of the taste but needing something to wash away the bitterness on his tongue. When had gratefulness become interchangable with love? Thank you for existing, thank you for causing me heartbreak; thank you for taking my soul in your hands and ringing it out. Alex snorts into his drink. The notion is completely absurd. 

"David Attenborough, that's what I'm thankful for, and Blue Planet." Angelica announces as she stands up, clumsily putting a blanket around her father's shoulders. Peggy laughs and Eliza rolls her eyes. 

"Who's that?" Alex frowns. "Have I met him?" 

Peggy laughs even harder. 

"My muse." Angelica tells him, and tosses the last of the dried orange peel into the fire. It sputters, coughs, and dies out. Eliza takes that as the cue to hustle all of them up to bed. Alex helps her to scrounge more blankets and cover Philip, who snores away without waking. She wishes him sweet dreams, and kisses his forehead on the landing, for a blessing.

"Happy Thanksgiving." She says, and means it. 

"Same to you." Alex gives her a hug. 

 

* * *

 

"It's great here." He tells John when they Skype before bed, the clock not yet at eleven. The No Talk of Overthrowing the British Governor rule extends over the miles of static between he and John, and so they are forced to find other safe topics. John is sitting in a pair of boxers and a Hufflepuff sweater, and Alex has to concentrate very hard on keeping his eyes trained on John's face, or the overflowing shelf behind him stuffed with books and journals, or the covered easel trying to tiptoe off of the screen. They are trying to keep on safe topics; on, How Was the Drive, and, How Good Is Philip Schuyler At Cooking? 

Over the speakers comes a crackle of Disney music, and a round of French expletives as a champagne bottle pops off. 

"Am I keeping you from the party?" Alex raises an eyebrow and sips at his green tea. John laughs, light and easy. He swigs from the bottle of Sam Adams by his side. 

"It's a party by itself just talkin to you. I don't mind." He says with complete sincerity  and for the second time that day Alex is so touched he thinks he might cry. John shows Alex a few sketches he made of Hercules and Gilbert, curled asleep on the sofa like two interlocked commas, and they speculate on Do You Think They'll Ever Make it Official: a favourite topic. Alex thinks, briefly, about Peggy's poem about love, although he isn't sure why. 

"You should get some sleep." John says at last when Alex yawns for the third time in a row. Eleven o clock had rolled around and gone without either of them noticing anything. This, Alex realises, is the easiest conversation they have had in almost a fortnight. Maybe it is the lack of touches, or the fact that John cannot radiate warmth from shoulder-to-shoulder, or the alcohol lying in Alex's veins. Whatever it is, Alex is grateful. 

"Goodnight. I'll talk to you tomorrow, I promise." John does not laugh, but giggles, stupid adorable, and blows a kiss. His hand reaches for the end call button, and then he pauses. "No homo though." He says with a smirk. For Alex, that smirk is like barbed wire. It floats behind his eyes even as the lights go off and the screen flickers out. 

And it's all alright. It doesn't bother him that he is the only person in this room, despite the fact that he has never had a bedroom to himself in his entire life; it absolutely does not bother him at all that John is trying so hard to act platonic. This has been a good night, and nothing is going to bother him.

But it gets to him, inevitably, when he comes clawing up from sleep at two in the morning and looks over in expectation of Eliza in the bed opposite. There are tears on his breath and he balls up around the rise of his breasts and the emptiness in his gut. It had been different, in his dreams, until he was naked and then there had been snow; footprints making holes in it again, his hands reaching, John walking away. Hornets had stung at him, her, this body with all the wrong things, until she was able to bring herself out from the dreaming sea with hot salt on her cheeks and bitter heat between his

_(her)_

thighs. 

Alex stumbles onto the landing feeling like he might fall apart. There is a whirlwind of Mary and Girl in his head. He finds his way down to the kitchen, hand on the bannister, feet cold on the tiles. It still smells warm in here, the scent of roast and sauces hanging over the table and chairs and cupboards. Alex fumbles for a glass and watches as it slips through numb fingers, hits the carpet, and shatters. Alex freezes. There is nothing, for one blessed heartbeat, and then the faint creak of a board under bare feet.  The light clicks on. 

"You could have been quieter." Angelica, O light sleeper, hisses at him. Then she sees the tears on his face and stops short of a rant, everything about her dying down into curiosity and concern. She dissapears and then returns with crocs on her feet, dustpan and brush in hand. "What happened?- No, don't move. I've got it." 

"It was a dream, I just. I don't know." Alex presses his knuckles into his mouth and bites down, drawing blood from the skin and hating that taste. He stays where he stands until Angelica leaves again and returns with a pair of Philip Schuyler's old slippers.

"Sit down." Angelica points at a chair and Alex does as instructed, watching her pull out two cups and fill them with milk. She takes other things from the cupboard, too: cinnamon and vanilla, some sugar, nutmeg. Alex stares. Angelica has never really struck him as someone who likes a comfort drink in the night; she looks almost wrong in the kitchen. 

She gives him a glass once it is done and sinks back against the counter with her own, blowing on the foamed top absently. Sleep has left her soft on the surface, but she is still Angelica; still sharp.

"Peggy told me." Angelica starts, not looking at Alex. Her gaze is trained on the middle distance with the same intensity that runs through everything she does. "About your thing for John. How long?" 

"Since we... God, I don't know? The second time we walked home alone together, I think." Alex shrugs. She shakes her head, although at what exactly, Alex is unsure. 

"Why don't you just go for it?" Angelica asks, "Tell him." 

"Because he's a man, and he's gay, and I'm..." Alex stops himself there. There is that old, cold numbness in his stomach, his chest. He remembers Jefferson's hornets. 

"A man, Alex. You're a man." Angelica looks up at him, sharp as a whistle, no room for argument in her tone. 

"A man with breasts and a vagina." Alex says and her eyes go all hard. Not soft, not Angelica, but firm in her belief. 

"Yeah, okay, you've got those, but you're still a man. We all see you as that now." 

"With my clothes on." Alex says under his breath and fails to meet her eyes, although her gaze is blistering his neck. He takes a deep sip of his milk and it condenses in his stomach like a weight. He feels sick. "These dreams, Ange- it's like. I'm two people; like I'm less of a man for, for, even thinking of all, that." but he stops there, cheeks on fire.  Alex doesn't know where this is coming from, this onslaught, but every 

_(Don't be stupid, he's gay)_

doubt is rushing out of him. Angelica approaches and drops to her knees on the flagstones, her hand over his, distance closed all at once. If only it was so easy with John. 

"Only you see yourself that way." Angelica is gripping his hand hard enough to hurt now. "It isn't true, okay? You're a man, whatever you say, and whatever biology says. Fuck biology." 

"Says the future biologist." 

"All the more reason for you to listen to me." Angelica releases his hand. "Talk to John tomorrow, okay?" 

 

And Alex says okay, but when tomorrow comes with leftover turkey and cherry wine hangover, John does not pick up the phone. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Drop a review, chat to me on tumblr, and I'll be back soon. It's the last leg everyone and I'm hella excited.


	12. Chapter Ten, Part Two: Afterthanks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thankgiving is over but it's a day that just keeps on giving. (Also known as: all those references to Cherry Wine and Take me to Church by Hozier really did mean something, and I'm not sorry)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: suicide and abuse mention

 

 

  **Have you seen John?**

 

**-** Alex, 8:43 AM

**was gone when we woke up**

 

 -Lafayette, 8:55 AM

**Didn't he leave a note or something?**

 

**-** Alex, 8:56 AM

**He isn't actually a puppy, mon amis. He can look after himself.**

 

**-** Lafayette, 9:05 AM

**Are you okay?**

 

**-** Alex, 9:07 AM

**Too much cheap American beer :( John mite be having the same problem, he just took it outside**

 

**-** Lafayette, 9:15 AM

 

"Stop it." Peggy looks up from her book and, after a brief debate with herself, throws the bookmark at Alex's head. He looks up with a start from Lafayette's hangover problems.

"What?"

"Your foot. Keep still, for crying out loud. What's going on?" She rests the book splayed open against her chin and looks at him over the top of it, half amused and half ready to kill him.

"It's nothing- it's. John, okay? He was supposed to call, or text- or something." Alex clicks open his phone all over again, just in case he missed something, just in case the vibration and ring of a notification slipped through his clammy hand.

"He's probably hungover. I know I am." Peggy grunts in annoyance and tosses her book down on the coffee table, taking a deep drink from her mug. The smell of espresso hits him from across the lounge.

"Yeah, that's what Laff thinks." He wrinkles his nose and looks at his phone screen again.

"What's up with Alex?" Angelica asks as she steps into the room, somehow still standing after drinking almost double the amount of Peggy and Alex. She has been jogging, and looks like fresh winter, cheeks flushed and eyes bright. Eliza follows behind, equally windswept.

"John hasn't contacted him." Peggy answers before Alex can open his mouth. Angelica walks across the hallway into the kitchen and leaves the door open to call back,

"He's probably hungover." With the certainty of someone who has never had a hangover in their life. Alex looks at the clock. Nine in the morning. Twelve hours ago the three of them had been seated on the floor burning things, the only care on their minds love and thanksgiving in the firelight. In the sober daylight, Alex is afraid. Worry hounds him through the pages of his book, his essay, his writings in his notebook.

"He's a late sleeper anyway, isn't he?" Eliza points out as Angelica returns with two protein shakes and a chocolate bar for her sister. Alex sighs. Lucky him. He has three voices of reason, where most people only get one, and he has trouble listening to all of them.

 

By lunch his worry is white noise in his head, turning his leftover turkey sandwich into a lump in his stomach. He taps his foot incessantly and, for once, Angelica lets it go. She is impatient with him, although not entirely sympathetic. They watch Blue Planet, uncovering VHS tapes and wasting a good hour winding the tape back into the cassette case with fingers that quickly become raw. Peggy lights the fire. They discover that there is nothing left to burn.

Alex lies with his head on Eliza's lap and watches as whales jump out of water, soothed by the voice of the narrator who turns out to be David Attenborough. Angelica tells them about how she had discovered her love for waters and the life that inhabits them through their mother's old tapes, kept stacked in a box in the attic until Angelica found them. Breakups and failings had been dealt with like this. Alex just listens. Thanksgiving, he realises, is a time of great nostalgia in the Schuyler household.

Philip Schuyler joins them a little later on, and makes drinks, passing around home-roasted coffee with pride. Alex drinks it, little sips, wishes that he could stay in a place like this forever. The engines in his head were not silent, but they were idling, at least for a while.

Until he looked at the clock again, and realised that it had been over twelve hours since John promised to talk to him; blew him that kiss with his barbed-wire smile. Eliza curls her fingers deeper into his hair as she feels his shoulder tense, fingers over scalp, but for the first time ever Alex had become immune to her healing touches. They are for someone else now. Maria. Eliza has her love. 

She is texting for most of their Blue Planet marathon, a string of hearts and kisses just out of the corner of Alex's eye and the rally of quick flirtation that Eliza and Maria fell into so easily. How is this fair? Alex has to excuse himself. He curls up on the bathroom floor and tries to tell himself that the whole situation is fine. It doesn't matter that it's now three in the afternoon and his phone has been quiet as an empty stream, or that he is tucked in on himself crying in silence; it certainly doesn't matter that neither Lafayette or Hercules have heard from John all day. This too shall pass, or whatever the saying is.

But it won't, it won't. Alex finds himself strung out on the bed in the evening, with the weather turned to a wicked thing outside the windows, hail battering against the glass with alarming ferocity. Alex tries to sleep, he really does, but the winds get into his fitful doze and bring back memories of The Hurricaine until he wakes certain that the house and everyone in it is about to be swept away. His headphones are clamped tight over his ears and his stomach is churning. Too much rich food, he tries to tell himself, but it doesn't work. Fear, that's what it is. He begins to ask Lafayette if they are awake, but it is gone midnight. They really like their sleep. The chances of finding a late night chat partner in them are pretty slim. Alex pulls his headphones on and presses play without thinking, Take me to Church picking up from where he had paused it last night.

Alex opens up his laptop and tries to give John a call over Skype again. Nothing. Just an icon of a cartoon turtle. He gets out of bed and pads through the dripping shadows on the carpet to the window, his own reflection milky and rippling as it stares back at him. He rubs his eyes and presses his forehead to the glass, scrolling through his playlist for something that might help bring him out of his slump. Alex settles on Don McLean's _Everybody Loves Me, Baby_ and swallows the lyrics with a certain amount of bitter irony.

_Cherry Wine_ wakes him, when he had not even realised he was falling asleep. Alex peels his cheek from the window and rubs the numbness from his skin in confusion, trying to place what it was that pulled him out of his long-craved sleep. He stares at his phone for a long time, before it hits him, and he opens up his texts from John in a fumble.

 

**u awake?**

-Sunchild Laurens, 1:19 AM

**Alex?**

-1:19 AM

**Come on the 1 time I need u this time of morn ur asleep**

-1:21 AM

Alex didn't even bother to text back. He just hit call and held his phone to his ear with a shaking hand.

"I'm outside." Is the hushed whisper and Alex tries to pull himself out of sleep, convinced that he misheard. 

"Sorry?"

"I'm outside. Can you come and, I've been on a bus for hours... It's fucking freezing." John's voice is shaking and it sounds like blue lips, chattering teeth, tears. Alex stares at the darkness outside.

"Whereabouts?"

"The gate. Not the big ones, the, the side one. You know?" John whispers and Alex can hardly hear him over the rain; hardly believe that this is happening. Convinced that his anxiety has conjured up this strange dream in order to mess with his head.

"I know- shit." Alex pushes his feet into his old trainers, which have almost fallen apart by this point from the dampness. The reality of this, of John turning up in the dead hours of the morning, has yet to catch up with him. He slips out into the hallway and pauses a beat outside of Angelica's door, terrified of being heard, but for once luck is on his side. Alex only wastes another second to give thanks to whatever is listening up there, and takes off at a tiptoeing run. 

He finds John outside, soaked to the bone, dressed in a smart blue button-down that he has absolutely no business wearing, and a pair of jeans that look like they cost a few hundred dollars and had never been worn. The label peeks, bright orange, over the beltline. They stare at one another: John, red-eyed, bitten-lipped, split cheek; Alex, nightshirt and boxers, unbound, shaking. 

"What-?" Alex starts to ask, ever the curious one. John wipes his streaming nose on his sleeve and shakes his head. 

No more words are exchanged. They stumble back into the house and up the stairs, into Alex's room, where the radiator is rattling away and John immediately peels off the shirt without a thought. Alex looks away, around, anywhere but John. 

"Here." He tosses his knitted jumper at John, who pulls it on with relief. "And these." Alex finds the only pair of clean trousers he has left, a pair of James' old joggers. He looks away as John changes, aware of the sound of the belt buckle clinking against the floor and the whisper of fabric on skin. Everything is amplified in the small hours. Alex still feels unreal. He expects that he will wake up any minute now. 

"I told him, Alex. He was asking, so I- fuck-" Alex turns around to see John in a knot with the blankets, shaking, fingernails cutting into flesh. There is anguish in his face. The bastard father, Alex remembers, and the cracks in John's face fill the rest of the story. He edges nearer to the bed and sits on the end of it, soaked too but unwilling to leave John in order to get changed; not like this. 

"John, I didn't mean it- you don't have to tell me-" 

"I do." John's eyes are too bright as he grabs Alex's wrist. "I told him I love a man." He says it like the end of the world and although Alex only has a vague idea of what happened to John, there is very little doubt that it might just be. For John, anyway. Maybe for Alex too, and he hates how selfish it is, to be thinking of that when John is breaking down, but this all sounds an awful lot like a confession. Alex sits back. He presses his face in his hands. 

"John." But he cannot make anything else come out, and John has stopped listening. He is rifling through his soaked trouser pockets and muttering curses. "John, John." that name, that ambrosia, that golden food deadly to mortals. Alex reaches to  him with it, takes the other man's hands, stills them between his own warm ones. John looks up. 

"I can't find my phone. I had it, at the cafe, and now I- or my headphones. The, the red ones, they were with it. They.." 

" _John!_ " 

"Alex?" 

"Stop it." Alex says, more severe than he had intended but John is on the verge of hysteria. 

"I told him I love a man." John says again. Then he is there, hands on Alex's knees, shoulders, cheeks, and Alex is bringing his palms between them with a gasp. Their eyes meet, wide and startled. Alex can taste complementary mint chocolate and coffee on John's breath. He lowers his hands. 

If there is ever going to be a moment Alex simultaneously wants to keep and take back, it is this one. Emotion freezes between them on the slowing rhythm of John's breath, the eyes hooded in anticipation opening again; the way that John looks at him, with such a tender-raw expression that Alex can do nothing but wrap his arms around the other man. John, like some grounded baby bird, folds into him.

"Not like this." Alex whispers. "It means nothing like this."

"I know. I'm sorry." John whispers into Alex's collarbone. Really, Alex's anxiety hisses in his ear, this means nothing at all. John needs someone, anyone, and Alex just happens to be here. So what, Alex replies. He runs his fingers through John's hair. He'll just be there then, awake until John falls asleep. 

 

"Alex, Alex. I made pancakes, so you better get yourself-" the door bangs into the wall, but it is the long silence that wakes him, confused, exhausted. He tries to sit up, and finds John's weight sprawled across his lap, head on his stomach. Sound asleep. John has Alex's headphones on, but his phone has long since died. "What the fuck?" Peggy asks. 

"I'm not, sure." Alex starts as he leans across the bed to plug his phone in to charge. 

"You're not sure how he got here, or?" 

"The bus." Alex feels stupid. He disentangles himself, limb by limb, wire by by wire, from John's sleeping warmth. "I don't know what happened, though." 

"Barfight?" Peggy points at the bruise that has formed while they slept, a dark blotch on John's cheek. She is being neither funny nor sarcastic, but serious. Her face is like stone. 

"He mentioned his father." Alex shrugs. 

"You better come down for pancakes then." Peggy says, as if that is the end of it. Which it is, in a way. There are questions when John trails Alex into the kitchen, most of them asked by Philip Schuyler, who gets a pack of ice and sits John down in the lounge with a hot water bottle for the shakes which refuse to stop. Alex hovers by John, unsure of how much last night meant, unsure if he is allowed to move in and brush John's tangled hair from his face just as much as he wants to. John just offers weak smiles and drinks the tea he is given, but he is quiet, subdued. Herc's old jumper makes him look tiny. 

When they start to load the car up, John takes Alex's bag from him and hands over his phone and headphones. They share a warm smile, just the two of them. 

"I like to think that I've been a good influence on your music." John says when they are in the car heading back. Alex smiles and looks down. Their fingers are within touching distance. So he closes the gap. Not a handhold, or a fingerlock; just their pinky fingers, curled side by side. Angelica is watching in the rearview mirror when Alex looks up again, and they smile at one another with their eyes. 

Angelica draws up outside of John's building and Alex gets out as well, walking with John up to the front doors.

"Will you be okay?" Alex asks.

"Should be, but it's hard to say." John gives him something that might qualify for a smile, were it less like a grimace. "Laff might murder me." He laughs. Alex lightly nudges his shoulder with an attempt at a frown.

"Don't joke. Really, John. Will you be okay?" Alex is thinking about his cousin as he asks it, the cousin whose jokes and smiles he had believed right up until the body was found in the bathtub. John isn't his cousin, and yet, and yet.

 He closes the distance between their hands again, or tries to anyway, but John has his in the jogger pockets. Alex mirrors his pose. 

"I'll live." 

"Make sure you do." 

"It's a promise." John takes a halfstep back towards the door. "I could never break a promise to you." 

"Well in that case, I should go." Alex swallows down the ache in his throat and turns. He starts to walk away, back to where all three of the Schuyler sisters are watching through the car windows and trying to pretend that they're not. Alex scowls. He suddenly wants to hit something, preferably himself, with a pull in his gut that becomes sharper every step that he takes. Of course it meant nothing. He hears the double doors open and close behind him, and the ring of the bell for the inner doors. It sounds like heartbreak. Alex walks a little faster. The doors open again. 

"Hey, hey, wait!" John shouts and Alex hardly dares to turn back. John skids to a stop in front of him. "You forgot something."

"What?" Alex sounds too defensive. John raises an eyebrow and leans in, his hands coming out of his pockets. 

"This." John smiles. And kisses him. 

Scrap everything else, every other moment of joy and sweetness, because this one. This is the one that Alex will want to keep forever, he knows it. John is a clumsy kisser, and Alex is certain that he is no better himself, but there is such an exquisite joy in feeling his fingers link with John's and their heat form a little sphere around them. He wishes that he could hold it, just like this, until the sun goes down and the world stops turning; but that would be asking for eternity, and Angelica is only going to give him a few minutes. 

The blaring of the horn pulls them apart. 

"S, so should I see you tomorrow?" Alex is buzzing. John grins. 

"'Course. King's?"  

"Where else?" Alex lifts himself a little on his toes, definitely not _completely_ on his tiptoes though, and kisses John's cheek. Angelica hits the car horn again. Alex runs back into the warmth of the car, to Peggy cheering and Eliza twisting around from the front seat to high-five him. Angelica abandons all dignity and undoes her seatbelt in order to crush Alex into a hug. The four of them are giggling and Alex has to prise himself free in order to get his breath back, his cheeks flushed and his heart pounding in his chest. 

He looks back as they drive away, his hand lifted to wave goodbye to John and in the cluster of trees at the bottom of the drive, standing opposite the spot where he and John had been kissing moments before, Alex catches sight of the coathanger shoulders and smirking face of Charles Lee. Ice slips into Alex's stomach. 

Just wait until I tell Seabury, that face said.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you want to scream at me, drop some comments below, and if you have any writing prompts for me come over to [tumblr](https://pistachiomercutio.tumblr.com/) and stick them in my ask box.

**Author's Note:**

> How on earth will Washington handle him, the orphan immigrant ready to make a difference?  
> •••  
> Come talk to me on tumblr for updates and fandom rambles [pistachiomercutio](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/pistachiomercutio)


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